scholarly journals Identifying Fatigue Indicators Using Gait Variability Measures: A Longitudinal Study on Elderly Brisk Walking

Sensors ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (23) ◽  
pp. 6983
Author(s):  
Guoxin Zhang ◽  
Ivy Kwan-Kei Wong ◽  
Tony Lin-Wei Chen ◽  
Tommy Tung-Ho Hong ◽  
Duo Wai-Chi Wong ◽  
...  

Real-time detection of fatigue in the elderly during physical exercises can help identify the stability and thus falling risks which are commonly achieved by the investigation of kinematic parameters. In this study, we aimed to identify the change in gait variability parameters from inertial measurement units (IMU) during a course of 60 min brisk walking which could lay the foundation for the development of fatigue-detecting wearable sensors. Eighteen elderly people were invited to participate in the brisk walking trials for 60 min with a single IMU attached to the posterior heel region of the dominant side. Nine sets of signals, including the accelerations, angular velocities, and rotation angles of the heel in three anatomical axes, were measured and extracted at the three walking times (baseline, 30th min, and 60th min) of the trial for analysis. Sixteen of eighteen participants reported fatigue after walking, and there were significant differences in the median acceleration (p = 0.001), variability of angular velocity (p = 0.025), and range of angle rotation (p = 0.0011), in the medial–lateral direction. In addition, there were also significant differences in the heel pronation angle (p = 0.005) and variability and energy consumption of the angles in the anterior–posterior axis (p = 0.028, p = 0.028), medial–lateral axis (p = 0.014, p = 0.014), and vertical axis (p = 0.002, p < 0.001). Our study demonstrated that a single IMU on the posterior heel of the dominant side can address the variability of kinematics parameters for elderly performing prolonged brisk walking and could serve as an indicator for walking instability, and thus fatigue.

Micromachines ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 352
Author(s):  
Ruonan Li ◽  
Xuelian Wei ◽  
Jiahui Xu ◽  
Junhuan Chen ◽  
Bin Li ◽  
...  

Accurate monitoring of motion and sleep states is critical for human health assessment, especially for a healthy life, early diagnosis of diseases, and medical care. In this work, a smart wearable sensor (SWS) based on a dual-channel triboelectric nanogenerator was presented for a real-time health monitoring system. The SWS can be worn on wrists, ankles, shoes, or other parts of the body and cloth, converting mechanical triggers into electrical output. By analyzing these signals, the SWS can precisely and constantly monitor and distinguish various motion states, including stepping, walking, running, and jumping. Based on the SWS, a fall-down alarm system and a sleep quality assessment system were constructed to provide personal healthcare monitoring and alert family members or doctors via communication devices. It is important for the healthy growth of the young and special patient groups, as well as for the health monitoring and medical care of the elderly and recovered patients. This work aimed to broaden the paths for remote biological movement status analysis and provide diversified perspectives for true-time and long-term health monitoring, simultaneously.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 5280
Author(s):  
Jongseok Lee ◽  
Wonhyeong Jeong ◽  
Jaeoh Han ◽  
Taesu Kim ◽  
Sehoon Oh

Wheelchairs are an important means of transportation for the elderly and disabled. However, the movement of wheelchairs on long curbs and stairs is restricted. In this study, a wheelchair for climbing stairs was developed based on a mechanical transmission system that rotates the entire driving part through a link structure and an actuator to change the speed. The first mode drives the caterpillar, and the second mode drives the wheels. When driving on flat ground, it uses landing gears and wheels, and when climbing stairs, it uses the caterpillar; accordingly, a stable driving is possible. The stability of the transmission is confirmed through stress analysis. The method used in our study makes it is possible to manufacture lightweight wheelchairs because a single motor drives both the wheel and caterpillar through the transmission system.


1998 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-46
Author(s):  
Jonathan Oberlander

There is growing enthusiasm for transforming Medicare into a voucher system. Advocates claim vouchers would increase the health care choices available to Medicare beneficiaries, reduce the regulatory burden on the federal government, and promote the benefits of fair market competition. In addition, some analysts contend vouchers are the only feasible solution to Medicare's short-term financing problems and the long-term “crisis” of the retirement of the baby-boom generation. The author argues against these claims. Vouchers would not work as advertised by proponents because of the limitations of risk-adjustment methods and unrealistic assumptions about consumer choice. Moreover, the elderly and disabled Medicare population is ill-suited to cope in a competitive insurance system. Implementation of vouchers would therefore pose a threat to both the health of beneficiaries and the stability of the Medicare program. The implications of this analysis for Medicare reform are discussed.


The theory developed in an earlier paper (Chandrasekhar 1953) is extended to allow for counter-rotation of the two cylinders. Explicit results are given for the case when the two cylinders rotate in opposite directions with equal angular velocities.


2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (7) ◽  
pp. 283-294
Author(s):  
Munsuck Jang ◽  
Woosu Kim ◽  
Seungjin Yoon ◽  
Eunghyuk Lee
Keyword(s):  

Author(s):  
Nishanth P

Falls have become one of the reasons for death. It is common among the elderly. According to World Health Organization (WHO), 3 out of 10 living alone elderly people of age 65 and more tend to fall. This rate may get higher in the upcoming years. In recent years, the safety of elderly residents alone has received increased attention in a number of countries. The fall detection system based on the wearable sensors has made its debut in response to the early indicator of detecting the fall and the usage of the IoT technology, but it has some drawbacks, including high infiltration, low accuracy, poor reliability. This work describes a fall detection that does not reliant on wearable sensors and is related on machine learning and image analysing in Python. The camera's high-frequency pictures are sent to the network, which uses the Convolutional Neural Network technique to identify the main points of the human. The Support Vector Machine technique uses the data output from the feature extraction to classify the fall. Relatives will be notified via mobile message. Rather than modelling individual activities, we use both motion and context information to recognize activities in a scene. This is based on the notion that actions that are spatially and temporally connected rarely occur alone and might serve as background for one another. We propose a hierarchical representation of action segments and activities using a two-layer random field model. The model allows for the simultaneous integration of motion and a variety of context features at multiple levels, as well as the automatic learning of statistics that represent the patterns of the features.


2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (08) ◽  
pp. 1750105
Author(s):  
SAYUP KIM ◽  
JONGRYUN ROH ◽  
JOONHO HYEONG ◽  
YOUNGHO KIM

It is generally believed that running on a curved surface is more unstable than running on a flat surface. In this study, the dynamic stability of locomotion on a nonmotorized curved treadmill (NMCT) with three curvature radii was compared with that on a motorized flat treadmill. Sixteen healthy adult men maintained four different self-paced speeds: slow walking, fast walking, jogging, and running. Significant differences were statistically verified using two-way repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) according to the curvature radii and speeds, and the interaction effects were confirmed. Furthermore, to understand the significant differences between the speed and curvature radius, post hoc analyses were performed using one-way ANOVA. Except for the step width, the other parameters showed differences and correlation effects between the curvature radius and speed. As the curvature radius decreased, the stability decreased at slow speeds (slow walking) but increased at fast speeds (running). However, as the curvature radius increased, the stability increased at slow speeds (slow walking) but decreased at high speeds (running). The study results will help in suggesting the appropriate curvature radius for different user types such as athletes, the elderly, and people who require rehabilitation and will serve as preliminary data for designing the curvature radii of NMCTs.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 839-845
Author(s):  
Xiaoxiu Fu ◽  
Lin Ma ◽  
Yang Cao ◽  
Hengzhong Xu ◽  
Yan Guo

Nimodipine (NIMO) has been identified as a second-generation dihydropyridine calcium channel antagonist. NIMO’s specificity for the cerebrovascular smooth muscle contributes to its broad usage in treating ischemic cerebrovascular diseases in the elderly. Therefore, enhancing NIMO’s therapeutic effect and reducing its adverse reactions caused by short-term repeated use have become a focus of research. As a result, a new controlled-release preparation of NIMO, the carboxymethyl chitosan/nimodipine-hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin nanoparticle (Nano-NIMO), was constructed based on hydroxypropyl-β-cyclodextrin. The novel composite Nano-NIMO preparation could significantly improve the stability of NIMO in rat plasma, achieving an absolute bioavailability as high as 62.3%, which is three times that of the traditional NIMO oral preparation. Therefore, Nano-NIMO is expected to provide a new direction for the preparation of modified controlled-release Nano- NIMO agents.


The IoT is a new concept that provides a world where smart, connected, embedded systems operate, giving rise to the amount of data from different sources that are considered to have highly useful and valuable information. Data mining would play a critical role in creating smarter IoT. Traditional care of an elderly person is a difficult and complex task. The need to have a caregiver with the elderly person almost all the time drains the human and financial resources of the health care system. The emergence of Artificial intelligence has allowed the conception of technical assistance where it helps and reduces the time spent by the caregiver with the elderly person. This work aims to focus on analyzing techniques that are used for prediction purposes of falls in the elderly. We examine the applicability of three classification algorithms for IoT data. These algorithms are analyzed and a comparative study is undertaken to find the classifier that performs the best analysis on the dataset using a set of predefined performance metrics to compare the results of each classifier.


2002 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 365-370 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph M. Furman ◽  
Mark S. Redfern

This study assessed visual-otolith interaction in healthy older humans and compared responses from older subjects to those of younger subjects. Using off-vertical axis rotation (OVAR) to stimulate the otolith organs, eye movement responses, measured using electro-oculography, were recorded during rotation in the dark, rotation with an earth-fixed lighted visual surround, and rotation with a subject-fixed fixation target. Results indicated that older subjects, like young subjects, exhibit a modulation component that was as large during rotation with a lighted earth-fixed visual surround as that seen in the dark and a modulation component during rotation with a subject-fixed visual target that was incompletely suppressed. The modulation component was, in general, larger in the older subjects. This study confirms findings from a previous study of visual-otolith interaction in young subjects and suggests that older subjects, like young subjects, have difficulty visually suppressing the modulation component induced by off-vertical axis rotation.


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