Accuracy of caring personnel in estimating water intake based on missing liquid in drinking vessels.

In this contribution a measurement regarding estimations of filling levels in drinking vessels is presented. Ensuring a sufficient hydration is an important task in nursing homes. Monitoring of fluid intake is normally achieved by visual examination of drinking vessels conducted by staff members. This contribution describes a measurement targeted at evaluating this method in order to analyze the requirements of technical aids. Data gained by conducting this measurement in a cooperating elderly people home is presented and analyzed. Key results are that residents drink on average 5 to 10 percent less than it is recorded and that estimations of especially partly filled vessels vary strongly. Both, the type of drinking vessel and the current filling level influence the accuracy and precision of the difference between estimation and actual missing liquid.

A portable system for quantitative assessment of parkinsonian rigidity.

Rigidity is one of the primary symptoms of Parkinson's disease. Passive flexion and extension of the elbow is used to assess rigidity in this study. An examiner flexes and extends the subject's elbow joint through a rigidity assessment cuff attached around the wrist. Each assessment lasts for 10 seconds. Two force sensor boxes and an inertial measurement unit are used to measure the applied force and the state of the elbow movement. Elastic and viscous values will be obtained through a least squares estimation with all the data. 9 healthy subjects were tested with this system in two experimental conditions: 1) normal state (relaxed); 2) imitated rigidity state. Also the subjects were performed the assessment task with different frequencies and elbow movement ranges. The imitated rigidity action increases viscosity and elasticity. The effect sizes (Cohen's d) of the viscosity and elasticity between normal state and imitated state are 1.61 and 1.36 respectively, which means the difference is significant. Thus, this system can detect the on-off fluctuations of parkinsonian rigidity. Both wrist movement angle and frequency have small effect on the viscosity, but have elevated effect on the elasticity.

First application of behavoir recognition through the recording of ADL by radio modules in a home.

In this contribution the behavior of an elderly couple, recorded by a radio module system in their own home is analyzed. There is an increasing interest in giving elderly people the possibility to live at their own homes as long as possible. Since diseases like dementia are diagnosed through the change of behavior, especially the activities of daily living (ADL), there is a growing need of an objective instrument for measuring behavioral changes. Therefore the Eventlogger was developed and installed for 32 days in a home of an elderly couple. Throughout this paper the outcome of the data collection as well as first steps for analyzing it will be discussed. Furthermore we were able to observe different routines of the diseased and the healthy person. The diseased proband follows a very strict routine whereas the healthy proband routines are dependent on different factors.

A system for respiratory motion detection using optical fibers embedded into textiles.

In this contribution, a first prototype for mobile respiratory motion detection using optical fibers embedded into textiles is presented. The developed system consists of a T-shirt with an integrated fiber sensor and a portable monitoring unit with a wireless communication link enabling the data analysis and visualization on a PC. A great effort is done worldwide to develop mobile solutions for health monitoring of vital signs for patients needing continuous medical care. Wearable, comfortable and smart textiles incorporating sensors are good approaches to solve this problem. In most of the cases, electrical sensors are integrated, showing significant limits such as for the monitoring of anaesthetized patients during Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). OFSETH (Optical Fibre Embedded into technical Textile for Healthcare) uses optical sensor technologies to extend the current capabilities of medical technical textiles.