PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Wireless network detects falls by the elderly

Utah engineers: Invention eliminates need to wear alert system

2013-09-09
(Press-News.org) SALT LAKE CITY -- University of Utah electrical engineers have developed a network of wireless sensors that can detect a person falling. This monitoring technology could be linked to a service that would call emergency help for the elderly without requiring them to wear monitoring devices.

For people age 65 and older, falling is a leading cause of injury and death. Most fall-detection devices monitor a person's posture or require a person to push a button to call for help. However, these devices must be worn at all times. A 2008 study showed 80 percent of elderly adults who owned call buttons didn't use the device when they had a serious fall, largely because they hadn't worn it at the time of the fall.

Now, University of Utah electrical engineers Brad Mager and Neal Patwari have constructed a fall-detection system using a two-level array of radio-frequency sensors placed around the perimeter of a room at two heights that correspond to someone standing or lying down. These sensors are similar to those used in home wireless networks. As each sensor in the array transmits to another, anyone standing -- or falling -- inside the network alters the path of signals sent between each pair of sensors.

Mager is presenting the new fall-detection system Tuesday, Sept. 10 in London at the 24th Annual Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications.

The team plans to develop this proof-of-concept technology into a commercial product through Patwari's Utah-based startup company, Xandem Technology. The study was funded by the National Science Foundation.

"The idea of 'aging-in-place,' in which someone can avoid moving to a nursing home and live in their own home, is growing," says Patwari, senior author of the study and associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Utah. "Ideally, the environment itself would be able to detect a fall and send an alert to a caregiver. What's remarkable about our system is that a person doesn't need to remember to wear a device."

By measuring the signal strength between each link in the network -- similar to the number of "bars" on your cell phone -- an image is generated to show the approximate location of a person in the room with a resolution of about six inches. This imaging technique, called radio tomography, uses the one-dimensional link measurements from the sensor network to build up a three-dimensional image.

"With this detection system, a person's location in a room or building can be pinpointed with high accuracy, eliminating the need to wear a device," says Mager, a graduate student in electrical and computer engineering and first author of this study. "This technology can also indicate whether a person is standing up or lying down."

What's more, the system is programmed to detect whether a fall was indeed a dangerous one, rather than someone simply lying down on the floor. By conducting a series of experiments measuring the amount of time that elapsed when a person fell, sat down, or laid down on the ground, the researchers determined a time threshold for accurately detecting a fall. This information was fed back into algorithms used to determine whether a given event was a fall or one of the other benign activities.



INFORMATION:

University of Utah College of Engineering

72 S. Central Campus Dr.
Room 1650 WEB
Salt Lake City, UT 84112
801-581-6911 fax: 801-581-8692 http://www.coe.utah.edu



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Young adults reminisce about music from before their time

2013-09-09
Music has an uncanny way of bringing us back to a specific point in time, and each generation seems to have its own opinions about which tunes will live on as classics. New research suggests that young adults today are fond of and have an emotional connection to the music that was popular for their parents' generation. "Music transmitted from generation to generation shapes autobiographical memories, preferences, and emotional responses, a phenomenon we call cascading 'reminiscence bumps,'" explains psychological scientist and lead researcher Carol Lynne Krumhansl of ...

Better tests for liver toxicity would mean more medicines -- and safer medicines -- for patients

2013-09-08
Contact: Michael Bernstein m_bernstein@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6042 Michael Woods m_woods@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6293 American Chemical Society Better tests for liver toxicity would mean more medicines -- and safer medicines -- for patients INDIANAPOLIS, Sept. 8, 2013 — How many breakthrough new drugs never reach patients because tests in clinical trials suggested a high risk of liver damage when the drug actually was quite safe? That question underpins major ...

Explaining why so many cases of cardiac arrest strike in the morning

2013-09-08
Contact: Michael Bernstein m_bernstein@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6042 Michael Woods m_woods@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6293 American Chemical Society Explaining why so many cases of cardiac arrest strike in the morning INDIANAPOLIS, Sept. 8, 2013 — Evidence from people with heart disease strongly supports the existence of the molecular link first discovered in laboratory mice between the body's natural circadian rhythms and cardiac arrest or sudden cardiac death (SCD) ...

Reverse combustion? Turning carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuel back into fuel

2013-09-08
Contact: Michael Bernstein m_bernstein@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6042 Michael Woods m_woods@acs.org 317-262-5907 (Indianapolis Press Center, Sept. 6-11) 202-872-6293 American Chemical Society Reverse combustion? Turning carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuel back into fuel INDIANAPOLIS, Sept. 8, 2013 — With almost 40 billion tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) released each year from burning coal, gasoline, diesel and other fossil fuels in the United States alone, scientists are seeking ways to turn the tables on the ...

Study suggests fish oil could help protect alcohol abusers from dementia

2013-09-08
MAYWOOD, Il. – A Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine study suggests that omega-3 fish oil might help protect against alcohol-related dementia. Previous studies have shown that long-term alcohol abuse increases the risk of dementia. The Loyola study found that in the brain cells of rats exposed to high levels of alcohol, a fish oil compound protected against inflammation and cell death. The study by Michael A. Collins, PhD, and colleagues was reported Sept. 8 at the 14th Congress of the European Society for Biomedical Research on Alcoholism in Warsaw. An ...

Virtual monitoring could aid adherence to TB medication

2013-09-08
Barcelona, Spain: Virtual observation of patients taking their prescribed TB medication, could prove an effective technique for ensuring patients effectively complete their course of treatment. The research will be presented today (8 September 2013) at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Annual Congress. The new study suggests an alternative method to directly observed treatment (DOT), which is recommended by the World Health Organization. Directly observing treatments is often time consuming for a patient and is resource intensive for outreach projects, which seek ...

Road traffic pollution increases risk of death for bronchiectasis patients

2013-09-08
Barcelona, Spain: Living close to a busy road is associated with a higher risk of death in people with bronchiectasis. A new study, presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Annual Congress in Barcelona today (8 September 2013), has added to the growing body of evidence demonstrating the damaging effects of road-side pollution. Bronchiectasis is a condition in which the airways of the lungs become abnormally widened, leading to a build-up of excess mucus. It can be caused by cystic fibrosis (CF), and experts usually categorise the condition as cases either ...

First trial to compare e-cigarettes with nicotine patches

2013-09-08
Barcelona, Spain: First trial to compare e-cigarettes with nicotine patches shows comparable success in helping smokers to quit. The first ever trial to compare e-cigarettes with nicotine patches has found that both methods result in comparable success in quitting, with roughly similar proportions of smokers who used either method remaining abstinent from smoking for six months after a 13 week course of patches or e-cigarettes. The study, presented today (8 September 2013) at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Annual Congress in Barcelona, Spain and published in ...

Rapid diagnostic tests decrease waiting time for drug-resistant TB patients

2013-09-08
Barcelona, Spain: Results of a new study suggest that three new diagnostic tests could each be used to successfully diagnose drug resistance in tuberculosis (TB) patients in a quarter of the time taken by the current method. The research, presented today (8 September 2013) at the European Respiratory Society's Annual Congress in Barcelona, has provided evidence that each test could be used as an effective alternative to standard testing, increasing the possibilities open to clinicians. Drug susceptibility tests are carried out in people with active TB in order to ...

Yin-yang effect of sodium and chloride presents salt conundrum

2013-09-08
'Eat less salt' is a mantra of our health-conscious times and is seen as an important step in reducing heart disease and hypertension. Too much salt in the diet – and specifically sodium – is widely acknowledged as a major risk factor for high blood pressure however, scientists have found that salt's other oft-overlooked constituent chloride might also play an important role. A study by researchers at the University of Glasgow has revealed that low chloride levels in the blood is an independent indicator of mortality risk in people with hypertension. The role of chloride ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Exercise as an anti-ageing intervention to avoid detrimental impact of mental fatigue

UMass Amherst Nursing Professor Emerita honored as ‘Living Legend’

New guidelines aim to improve cystic fibrosis screening

Picky eaters by day, buffet by night: Butterfly, moth diets sync to plant aromas

Pennington Biomedical’s Dr. Leanne Redman honored with the E. V. McCollum Award from the American Society for Nutrition

CCNY physicists uncover electronic interactions mediated via spin waves

Researchers’ 3D-printing formula may transform future of foam

Nurture more important than nature for robotic hand

Drug-delivering aptamers target leukemia stem cells for one-two knockout punch

New study finds that over 95% of sponsored influencer posts on Twitter were not disclosed

New sea grant report helps great lakes fish farmers navigate aquaculture regulations

Strain “trick” improves perovskite solar cells’ efficiency

How GPS helps older drivers stay on the roads

Estrogen and progesterone stimulate the body to make opioids

Dancing with the cells – how acoustically levitating a diamond led to a breakthrough in biotech automation

Machine learning helps construct an evolutionary timeline of bacteria

Cellular regulator of mRNA vaccine revealed... offering new therapeutic options

Animal behavioral diversity at risk in the face of declining biodiversity

Finding their way: GPS ignites independence in older adult drivers

Antibiotic resistance among key bacterial species plateaus over time

‘Some insects are declining but what’s happening to the other 99%?’

Powerful new software platform could reshape biomedical research by making data analysis more accessible

Revealing capillaries and cells in living organs with ultrasound

American College of Physicians awards $260,000 in grants to address equity challenges in obesity care

Researchers from MARE ULisboa discover that the European catfish, an invasive species in Portugal, has a prolonged breeding season, enhancing its invasive potential

Rakesh K. Jain, PhD, FAACR, honored with the 2025 AACR Award for Lifetime Achievement in Cancer Research

Solar cells made of moon dust could power future space exploration

Deporting immigrants may further shrink the health care workforce

Border region emergency medical services in migrant emergency care

Resident physician intentions regarding unionization

[Press-News.org] Wireless network detects falls by the elderly
Utah engineers: Invention eliminates need to wear alert system