Home-system design & analysis of gait characteristics to prevent fall in elderly people
It is a common phenomenon that every person in the world will grow old one day. Therefore, health problems on elderly will always be a very crucial issue to be looked at. This creates more problem as elderly generally will feel reluctant to visit hospital for frequent health screening. It is quite a...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Final Year Project |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2009
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10356/17175 |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| Institution: | Nanyang Technological University |
| Language: | English |
| Summary: | It is a common phenomenon that every person in the world will grow old one day. Therefore, health problems on elderly will always be a very crucial issue to be looked at. This creates more problem as elderly generally will feel reluctant to visit hospital for frequent health screening. It is quite a common case when a fall or even disease is too late to be prevented. In this way, it will be a good practice if the health screening can be brought to home. It is even better if the daily health screening becomes a norm for the elderly.
Falls are among the most frequent occasions happening on elderly. Moreover, falls can cause fatal effect on them. One of the issues related to elderly` health which can incur falls is the gait characteristics. They consist of spatial, temporal, kinetic as well as kinematic parameters. Thus, intelligent floor-mat is made for home-use. It can be integrated on floor in which elderly walk through frequently at home. The floor-mat will be able to capture the gait characteristics of the elderly. Apart from the intelligent floor-mat, another system consisting of accelerometer and inclinometer can also be implemented so that the gait characteristics can still be assessed when the elderly are not walking on the floor-mat. With this daily monitoring system, the changes in gait characteristics which are leading to proneness of falls and hardly being distinguished by naked-eyes can be noticed. Therefore, the person can be brought for health screening at hospital at the appropriate time. This is because an elderly people usually experiences changes in gait characteristics at some time before they fall or even have problems with their health.
The gait parameters that can be extracted from the system are flow of foot center of pressure (COP), step & stride length, step & stride width, step time, single support time, double support time, stance time, gait cycle time, step & stride velocity, cadence, heel strike force, toe-off force, and foot-floor angle at heel strike. On the whole, a home-system having reasonable price can be produced and is able to provide daily non-intrusive monitoring. Furthermore, it gives reliable and accurate gait characteristics data. At the end of the day, healthier and happier life can be brought to societies especially to the elderly. |
|---|