A Wearable System for Real-Time Continuous Monitoring of Physical Activity.

Fabrizio Taffoni,Angelica La Camera,Andrea Nicolò,Juan Ramón Velasco,Carlo Massaroni,Diego Rivera

doi:10.1155/2018/1878354

Abstract

Over the last decades, wearable systems have gained interest for monitoring of physiological variables, promoting health, and improving exercise adherence in different populations ranging from elite athletes to patients. In this paper, we present a wearable system for the continuous real-time monitoring of respiratory frequency (fR), heart rate (HR), and movement cadence during physical activity. The system has been experimentally tested in the laboratory (by simulating the breathing pattern with a mechanical ventilator) and by collecting data from one healthy volunteer. Results show the feasibility of the proposed device for real-time continuous monitoring of fR, HR, and movement cadence both in resting condition and during activity. Finally, different synchronization techniques have been investigated to enable simultaneous data collection from different wearable modules.

Highlights

Monitoring training is essential to optimizing performance, promoting health, and improving exercise adherence in different populations ranging from elite athletes to patients
We present a wearable system for the continuous real-time monitoring of respiratory frequency, heart rate (HR), and movement cadence during physical activity
The device developed for monitoring respiratory frequency, heart rate, and step cadence presented in the previous section can be used as a stand-alone system, connected to a smartphone, or as a node of a local network provided with a central master

Summary

Introduction

Monitoring training is essential to optimizing performance, promoting health, and improving exercise adherence in different populations ranging from elite athletes to patients. Coaches and practitioners potentially have a myriad of variables and training metrics to deal with, often recorded with different devices that are not synchronized, increasing the time needed to gain relevant information from data. This scenario results in a limited use of the available devices and facilities, which are often substituted by more straightforward solutions. An example of such decisionmaking process is the widespread choice of measuring perceived exertion using a subjective scale [1]. Physiological and mechanical variables, unlike RPE, can be measured continuously during exercise and can be real-time displayed

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Conclusion