A mobile phone navigator for older adults and persons with dementia

Tese de mestrado integrado. Engenharia Informática e Computação. Universidade do Porto. Faculdade de Engenharia. 201

Smart aging : utilisation of machine learning and the Internet of Things for independent living

Smart aging utilises innovative approaches and technology to improve older adults’ quality of life, increasing their prospects of living independently. One of the major concerns the older adults to live independently is “serious fall”, as almost a third of people aged over 65 having a fall each year. Dementia, affecting nearly 9% of the same age group, poses another significant issue that needs to be identified as early as possible. Existing fall detection systems from the wearable sensors generate many false alarms; hence, a more accurate and secure system is necessary. Furthermore, there is a considerable gap to identify the onset of cognitive impairment using remote monitoring for self-assisted seniors living in their residences. Applying biometric security improves older adults’ confidence in using IoT and makes it easier for them to benefit from smart aging. Several publicly available datasets are pre-processed to extract distinctive features to address fall detection shortcomings, identify the onset of dementia system, and enable biometric security to wearable sensors. These key features are used with novel machine learning algorithms to train models for the fall detection system, identifying the onset of dementia system, and biometric authentication system. Applying a quantitative approach, these models are tested and analysed from the test dataset. The fall detection approach proposed in this work, in multimodal mode, can achieve an accuracy of 99% to detect a fall. Additionally, using 13 selected features, a system for detecting early signs of dementia is developed. This system has achieved an accuracy rate of 93% to identify a cognitive decline in the older adult, using only some selected aspects of their daily activities. Furthermore, the ML-based biometric authentication system uses physiological signals, such as ECG and Photoplethysmogram, in a fusion mode to identify and authenticate a person, resulting in enhancement of their privacy and security in a smart aging environment. The benefits offered by the fall detection system, early detection and identifying the signs of dementia, and the biometric authentication system, can improve the quality of life for the seniors who prefer to live independently or by themselves

Secure Monitoring of Patients With Wandering Behavior in Hospital Environments

Today there is considerable interest for making use of the latest technological advancements for several healthcare applications. However, there are several challenges for making use of different technologies for healthcare applications. In particular, there is a need to ensure that the healthcare related services receive priority during events, such as legitimate failures of devices, congestion, and attacks in the networks. In this paper, we discuss some of the requirements for making use of technology for healthcare applications and propose techniques for secure monitoring of patients with wandering behavior in a hospital or elderly care environment. One of the aims of our work is to use technology for secure monitoring of patients with wandering behavior to keep them away from danger, or detect if the behavior of the patient violates the policies of the hospital, or even violates privacy policies of other patients. Our approach makes use of software defined networking (SDN), Wireless LAN (WLAN), and wearable devices for the patients. Our approach incurs low cost since WLAN is widely deployed. However, there are some challenges for making use of WLAN for monitoring dementia patients, since it is primarily used for accessing the Internet and its open nature is vulnerable to different types of security attacks. Hence we make use of SDN to solve some of these challenges and provide priority for the monitoring services. We have developed a security application for an SDN controller that can be used to enforce fine granular policies for communication between the hosts, real time location tracking of the patients, and deal with attacks on the hospital networks. The policy-based security enforcement helps to differentiate healthcare related traffic from other traffic and provide priority to the healthcare traffic. The real time location tracking detects wandering by patients and if necessary can raise alarms to the staff. The attack detection component makes use of attack signatures and behavior-based intrusion detection to deal with attacks on hospital networks. We will also present the prototype implementation of our model using ONOS SDN controller and OpenFlow Access Points

Development of an app as an activist force for Alzheimer's and dementia caregivers

Dissertação de Mestrado em Design, com a especialização em Design de Comunicação, apresentada na Faculdade de Arquitetura da Universidade de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Mestre.A doença de Alzheimer – uma das variantes doenças de Demência – está a aumentar exponencialmente devido ao envelhecimento populacional. A tendência demográfica de envelhecimento na Europa apresenta riscos e suscita a procura de soluções que retirem o melhor partido possível das tecnologias disponíveis. Portugal enfrenta uma série de desafios em matéria de qualidade de vida da sua população, dado que o cuidado dos idosos com demência é um problema que envolve a sua família. De facto, é patente a falta de recursos para cuidar de pessoas que vivem com a doença de Alzheimer. Escasseiam os centros de dia para acolher em segurança o número crescente de idosos com aquele diagnóstico. De acordo com as estimativas da Alzheimer Europe, estima-se que existem cerca de 153 000 casos de pessoas com Demência em Portugal, número que poderá triplicar em 2040. Esta investigação centra-se em métodos de avaliação para determinar se a tecnologia de reconhecimento facial contribui para o desenvolvimento de medidas preventivas de incidentes de deambulação em pessoas portadoras da doença de Alzheimer. Estas ocorrências exigem dos familiares cuidadores um envolvimento permanente, o que inevitavelmente afeta as suas vidas. Para responder às questões de investigação recorreu-se à revisão da teoria, análise e crítica de casos de estudo, entrevistas semiestruturadas, classificação de categorias e subcategorias de aplicação através do método de service blueprinting(fase não intervencionista) e à pesquisa prática, que apresenta e discute os resultados dos testes de usabilidade e da criação de personas que representam os diversos perfis de potenciais utilizadores da aplicação desenvolvida para smartphone (fase intervencionista). O naming proposto – NOSCO – radica numa palavra do grego antigo, que significa “conhecer”, e permite relacioná-lo com outros termos que foram importantes para o desenvolvimento da identidade visual da aplicação: memória, afetos, mobilização de várias vontades para ajudar o portador da doença de Alzheimer. A aplicação destina-se a smartphone e encontra-se, ainda, em fase de desenvolvimento. Os testes de usabilidade com um protótipo funcional forneceram indicadores que confirmam o potencial da aplicação para minimizar o impacto dos acidentes de deambulação, proporcionar um ambiente mais seguro para os doentes e familiares cuidadores, dar maior visibilidade social à doença de Alzheimer e facilitar a inclusão social dos idosos com esta patologia.ABSTRACT: Alzheimer’s disease – one of the forms of Dementia disease – is increasing exponentially due to the ageing of the human body. The current demographic trend in Europe for the aging population presents risks and generates a search for updated solutions. Portugal faces a number of challenges in the quality of life of its populations since the care of the elderly with dementia is a problem that involves their family. In fact, there is a lack of resources to care for people living with Alzheimer’s disease. Day care centres are scarce and fail to give continuous care to the growing number of elderly people with that diagnosis. According to Alzheimer Europe, there are an estimated 153,000 cases of people with dementia in Portugal, which could triple by 2040. This research focuses on assessment methods to determine whether facial recognition technology contributes for the development of preventive measures in wandering incidents that occur in people living with Alzheimer’s disease. These occurrences require family caregivers to be permanently involved, which will inevitably affect their lives. In order to answer the research questions, the author made use of the literature review, analysis and critique of a collection on empirical case studies, semi-structured interviews, classification of categories and subcategories of the mobile application through the use of a service blueprinting method (non-interventionist phase). As well as the elaboration of the practical research which presents and discusses the results of usability tests and the creation of personas that represent the various of potential user profiles of the application developed for smartphone (interventionist phase). The proposed naming – NOSCO – is based upon a word from ancient Greek, which means “to know”, and allows to relate it with other terms that were important for the development of the visual identity of the mobile application: memory, affections, mobilization of various wills to help the person living with Alzheimer’s disease. The application is intended for smartphones and is still under development. Usability tests with a functional prototype provided indicators that confirm the potential of the application to minimize the impact of wandering incidents, provide a safer environment for both patients and family caregivers, provide greater social visibility to Alzheimer’s disease, and facilitate social inclusion of the elderly with this pathology.N/