The motivation behind developing a smart home for health monitoring is centered around two key aspects: (i) cost of care and (ii) quality of care. The public expenditure on health care in Ontario alone surpassed $50 billion in 2014. Our proposed strategy to reduce the growing financial and social pressure is to create a health institution within the home, allowing doctors and other healthcare providers to monitor and analyze the health of their patients remotely using low-cost non-invasive sensor and network technologies that are installed innocuously within the home. The project entails retrofitting the interior of the house to develop and test smart technology that will enable older people to live in their homes longer. The entire project combines a wide variety of sensors and cutting-edge technologies in an innovative manner to monitor the health of seniors. As well as helping older patients to live more safely and independently in their own homes, the research project seeks to relieve the burden on family members and caregivers, and reduce non-emergency visits to the hospital.
Smart IPS Study

With an increase in the ageing and disabled populations, there is a rise in the need for home rehabilitation to understand the needs of elderly users. Through monitoring, individuals can understand the indoor patterns of users struggling with dementia or other health complications. In addition, by examining the physical activity and behaviour of older adults, it is possible to detect abnormal events, such as falls, seizures or loss of consciousness. A Smart Home allows clinicians to monitor one’s health and physical activity with the incorporation of various sensors, cameras, and other devices. The data collected can provide insight as to how users live their daily lives while coping with a disease or their response to a certain therapy. Furthermore, IPS can be easily integrated into a Smart Home due to its ability to connect various types of devices together. IPS consists of different technologies working together, and Smart Homes are designed to allow for the use of this technology. Overall, Smart Homes allow at-risk individuals to continue to live independently for a longer period.

• https://brighterworld.mcmaster.ca/articles/developing-smart-home-technology-to-help-seniors-stay-independent/
• https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/2019/07/17/mcmaster-university-testing-new-tech-at-westdale-smart-home-to-help-seniors-live-on-their-own.html

With an increase in the ageing and disabled populations, there is a rise in the need for home rehabilitation to understand the needs of elderly users. Through monitoring, individuals can understand the indoor patterns of users struggling with dementia or other health complications. In addition, by examining the physical activity and behaviour of older adults, it is possible to detect abnormal events, such as falls, seizures or loss of consciousness. A Smart Home allows clinicians to monitor one’s health and physical activity with the incorporation of various sensors, cameras, and other devices. The data collected can provide insight as to how users live their daily lives while coping with a disease or their response to a certain therapy. Furthermore, IPS can be easily integrated into a Smart Home due to its ability to connect various types of devices together. IPS consists of different technologies working together, and Smart Homes are designed to allow for the use of this technology. Overall, Smart Homes allow at-risk individuals to continue to live independently for a longer period.

• https://brighterworld.mcmaster.ca/articles/developing-smart-home-technology-to-help-seniors-stay-independent/
• https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/2019/07/17/mcmaster-university-testing-new-tech-at-westdale-smart-home-to-help-seniors-live-on-their-own.html

Students have actively utilized SHAPE to test their graduate and undergraduate research projects. Projects vary from generic IoT device development, Bio Feedback device optimization, Health Care Monitoring Systems and many more.

Such Projects consist of:

- Thermal Camera | - IMBED Application for OA Patients

- Smart Pillbox | - Cough Monitoring System

- Context Aware Emergency Detection System | - Nova Smartwatch - Indoor Positioning System

Indoor positioning systems are very similar to GPS systems, except they focus on smaller indoor locations as opposed to larger outdoor locations. Indoor positioning systems use the strength of signals sent from tracking devices like smartwatches and tags to accurately track the location of these devices. The IPS being tested in this trial uses Bluetooth signal strength levels to track the locations of smartwatches within the test subject’s household.

https://www.bitbrain.com/blog/indoor-positioning-system

Smartwatches are a type of wearable technology that expand a watches capability by implementing applications and sensors onto a wearable device. Smartwatches use small touchscreens that can display small scale applications like fitness tracking, weather reports and video playback. In this clinical trial, smartwatches are used to track the user’s position through their Bluetooth connectivity capabilities. The specific smartwatch used in this trial is an Android based smartwatch. The specifics of this watch are highlighted in the device description section of this document.

Wear OS by Google Smartwatches https://www.wareable.com/android-wear/polar-m600-review

SHAPE provides IoT developers the perfect platform to test their products in home settings. Several companies send samples of their devices along with setup and configuration instructions. McMaster engineering students then integrate these systems within the smart home.

Complete our contact form and test your devices using SHAPE

Funding Sources: N/A

Our Current Partners:

- Home Except

- Pi Vision