Home-based System Research Articles

Computer-aided automated detection of kidney disease using supervised learning technique

<p>In this paper, we propose an efficient home-based system for monitoring chronic kidney disease (CKD). As non-invasive disease identification approaches are gaining popularity nowadays, the proposed system is designed to detect kidney disease from saliva samples. Salivary diagnosis has advanced its popularity over the last few years due to the non-invasive sample collection technique. The use of salivary components to monitor and detect kidney disease is investigated through an experimental investigation. We measured the amount of urea in the saliva sample to detect CKD. Further, this article explains the use of predictive analysis using machine learning techniques and data analytics in remote healthcare management. The proposed health monitoring system classified the samples with an accuracy of 97.1%. With internet facilities available everywhere, this methodology can offer better healthcare services, with real-time decision support in remote monitoring platform.</p>

The Design of a Wireless Network Home-Based Elderly Care System Based on Artificial Intelligence Technology and Its Impact on the Construction of the Social Security System

Old age is the final stage in the life processes of a human being, and it is an age group comprising a segment of the oldest members of a population. During this phase of life, people need support and care. But in reality, due to changes in modern society, the elderly have to stay alone at home. Staying at old age homes is not possible for everyone. In current society, every member of the family has to work for a living and run the family. When this is the case, the elderly are left alone at home during the work hours of the other family members. In this research article, we are going to study the design of wireless network-based homes to ensure the safety and security of elderly people. Artificial intelligence (AI) is used to construct a safe and secure social system. In the current trend of smart homes, it is mandatory for people to install WSN-based home systems to take care of the elderly residents of their homes who stay alone for long periods of time. The home-based elderly care system is designed with the implementation of trending technologies like AI and WSN. The performance of the model is evaluated with the applied optimised neural network model and compared with the existing data summarization model. From the results, it can be seen that the proposed model has provided an accuracy of 98.89%, which is 4.77% higher than the proposed algorithm.

Photobiomodulation Therapy (PBMT) is Feasible and Acceptable in Pre-conditioning and Post-operative Recovery of Patients after Total Knee arthroplasty (TKA): A Clinical Case Series

Photobiomodulation therapy (PBMT) for minimal to moderate Kellgren and Lawrence grade knee osteoarthritis has significant evidence for effectiveness. The effect of PBMT in severe grades of osteoarthritis is less clear; and no studies have investigated the effect of PBMT before and after knee replacement surgery. This small study (n=4) aimed to understand the potential feasibility of undertaking a future randomised controlled clinical trial of a self-administered, home-based light patch system before and after total knee arthroplasty (TKA) The PBM device (450nm (6.75 mW/cm2) and 640nm (2.25 mW/cm2); 33kHz frequency, 4.5 J/cm2 radiant exposure) was self-applied by patients daily for 30 minutes for one week before, and 3 times in the week following hospital discharge after TKA. We measured numeric pain ratings, physical function and patient-reported outcomes at baseline one week prior to surgery, the day prior to surgery, at Day 4 after surgery, and at 1, 2, 4 and 6 weeks after hospital discharge. The study protocol and methods were found to be feasible and acceptable to participants. No pain was reported by any participants at 6-week follow-up. Functional measures of timed-up-and-go and 30 second chair stands test demonstrated marked improvement over the study period. No patients were requiring opioid analgesia at 6-week follow-up. Limitations included lack of gender diversity, the small number of participants and absence of information about post-hospital discharge opioid analgesic requirements from control group. The results provide confidence in progressing this research in an adequately powered, placebo-controlled, randomised clinical trial.

Pain fingerprinting using multimodal sensing: pilot study

Pain is a complex phenomenon, the experience of which varies widely across individuals. At worst, chronic pain can lead to anxiety and depression. Cost-effective strategies are urgently needed to improve the treatment of pain, and thus we propose a novel home-based pain measurement system for the longitudinal monitoring of pain experience and variation in different patients with chronic low back pain. The autonomous nervous system and audio-visual features are analyzed from heart rate signals, voice characteristics and facial expressions using a unique measurement protocol. Self-reporting is utilized for the follow-up of changes in pain intensity, induced by well-designed physical maneuvers, and for studying the consecutive trends in pain. We describe the study protocol, including hospital measurements and questionnaires and the implementation of the home measurement devices. We also present different methods for analyzing the multimodal data: electroencephalography, audio, video and heart rate. Our intention is to provide new insights using technical methodologies that will be beneficial in the future not only for patients with low back pain but also patients suffering from any chronic pain.

A home-based pulmonary rehabilitation mHealth system to enhance the exercise capacity of patients with COPD: development and evaluation

BackgroundPatients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) experience deficits in exercise capacity and physical activity as their disease progresses. Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) can enhance exercise capacity of patients and it is crucial for patients to maintain a lifestyle which is long-term physically active. This study aimed to develop a home-based rehabilitation mHealth system incorporating behavior change techniques (BCTs) for COPD patients, and evaluate its technology acceptance and feasibility.MethodsGuided by the medical research council (MRC) framework the process of this study was divided into four steps. In the first step, the prescription was constructed. The second step was to formulate specific intervention functions based on the behavior change wheel theory. Subsequently, in the third step we conducted iterative system development. And in the last step two pilot studies were performed, the first was for the improvement of system functions and the second was to explore potential clinical benefits and validate the acceptance and usability of the system.ResultsA total of 17 participants were enrolled, among them 12 COPD participants completed the 12-week study. For the clinical outcomes, Six-Minute Walk Test (6MWT) showed significant difference (P = .023) over time with an improvement exceeded the minimal clinically important difference (MCID). Change in respiratory symptom (CAT score) was statistically different (P = .031) with a greater decrease of − 3. The mMRC levels reduced overall and showed significant difference. The overall compliance of this study reached 82.20% (± 1.68%). The results of questionnaire and interviews indicated good technology acceptance and functional usability. The participants were satisfied with the mHealth-based intervention.ConclusionsThis study developed a home-based PR mHealth system for COPD patients. We showed that the home-based PR mHealth system incorporating BCTs is a feasible and acceptable intervention for COPD patients, and COPD patients can benefit from the intervention delivered by the system. The proposed system played an important auxiliary role in offering exercise prescription according to the characteristics of patients. It provided means and tools for further individuation of exercise prescription in the future.

Building a Smart Gardening System and Plant Monitoring Using IoT

Gardening activities usually required a lot of time and gardeners may face varieties of problems such as sticking to the designated watering schedule. Thus, this paper intends to solve these problems by introducing the Smart Gardening System. By using this system, users will be able to control and monitor the watering schedule and the sufficiency of lights while ensuring that the plants are taken care of accordingly. The smart gardening system is different from the normal gardening products that are already available in the market because of the implementation of Internet of Things (IoT) in the system to facilitate the work for its users. By using this home-based system, users can set the watering and lighting schedule automatically by using the designated application via smartphone. Besides, users will also be notified on the moisture level of soil, light-exposure, and the water level in water tank through the application. This will allow the users to monitor the watering system and only come to refill it when the water tank is empty. This system is an advantage as it can run automatically. From this research, the benefit of smart gardening system is proven via the execution of IoT which requires less human intervention for the system to operate. Moreover, the sensors are used to gather and update all the data that is convenience to the user to keep updated on the parameter and information about the plant in a real time without physical present.

The SleepFit Tablet Application for Home-Based Clinical Data Collection in Parkinson Disease: User-Centric Development and Usability Study.

BackgroundParkinson disease (PD) is a common, multifaceted neurodegenerative disorder profoundly impacting patients' autonomy and quality of life. Assessment in real-life conditions of subjective symptoms and objective metrics of mobility and nonmotor symptoms such as sleep disturbance is strongly advocated. This information would critically guide the adaptation of antiparkinsonian medications and nonpharmacological interventions. Moreover, since the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, health care practices are being reshaped toward a more home-based care. New technologies could play a pivotal role in this new approach to clinical care. Nevertheless, devices and information technology tools might be unhandy for PD patients, thus dramatically limiting their widespread employment.ObjectiveThe goals of the research were development and usability evaluation of an application, SleepFit, for ecological momentary assessment of objective and subjective clinical metrics at PD patients’ homes, and as a remote tool for researchers to monitor patients and integrate and manage data.MethodsAn iterative and user-centric strategy was employed for the development of SleepFit. The core structure of SleepFit consists of (1) an electronic finger-tapping test; (2) motor, sleepiness, and emotional subjective scales; and (3) a sleep diary. Applicable design, ergonomic, and navigation principles have been applied while tailoring the application to the specific patient population. Three progressively enhanced versions of the application (alpha, v1.0, v2.0) were tested by a total of 56 patients with PD who were asked to perform multiple home assessments 4 times per day for 2 weeks. Patient compliance was calculated as the proportion of completed tasks out of the total number of expected tasks. Satisfaction on the latest version (v2.0) was evaluated as potential willingness to use SleepFit again after the end of the study.ResultsFrom alpha to v1.0, SleepFit was improved in graphics, ergonomics, and navigation, with automated flows guiding the patients in performing tasks throughout the 24 hours, and real-time data collection and consultation were made possible thanks to a remote web portal. In v2.0, the kiosk-mode feature restricts the use of the tablet to the SleepFit application only, thus preventing users from accidentally exiting the application. A total of 52 (4 dropouts) patients were included in the analyses. Overall compliance (all versions) was 88.89% (5707/6420). SleepFit was progressively enhanced and compliance increased from 87.86% (2070/2356) to 89.92% (2899/3224; P=.04). Among the patients who used v2.0, 96% (25/26) declared they would use SleepFit again.ConclusionsSleepFit can be considered a state-of-the-art home-based system that increases compliance in PD patients, ensures high-quality data collection, and works as a handy tool for remote monitoring and data management in clinical research. Thanks to its user-friendliness and modular structure, it could be employed in other clinical studies with minimum adaptation efforts.Trial RegistrationClinicalTrials.gov NCT02723396; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02723396

Portable rotating grating stimulation for anisometropic amblyopia with 6\xa0months training

Treatment of grating stimulation has been used in amblyopia for decades, but high dropout rate and inconvenience for daily practice occur in previous studies. We developed a home-based portable system with rotating grating stimulation on a tablet. Thirty anisometropic amblyopic children were randomly allocated into the control or Grating group. They drew contour of the picture under patch of a better eye for 6 months. Best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA), grating acuity (GA), and contrast sensitivity (CS) were assessed at the baseline, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 6th months of training. All participants completed the 6-month training. Patched eyes of both groups exhibited no difference. Trained eyes of the control group had significantly slight improvement in BCVA and GA. In particular, the Grating group exhibited significantly higher BCVA, GA, and CS compared with those of the control group at the 3rd and 6th months of training. Moreover, percentage of the Grating group with great improvement (BCVA ≥ 0.3 or CS ≥ 0.3) was significantly larger than those of the control group at the 3rd or 6th months of training. The portable grating stimulation system demonstrates its trainability by no dropout and effectiveness by significant improvements in all assessments through a well experimental design.Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04213066, registered 30/12/2019, https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04213066.

Home-based telerehabilitation: A review of remote therapy frameworks

Remote therapy frameworks play the main role in home-based telerehabilitation. These remote therapies are exergames that help in the physical and cognitive rehabilitation of the patient. The objective of this review is to present the frameworks of home-based therapies using exergames and to identify the points that can be improved in the development of future systems. To carry out this research, the criteria of the PRISMA were adopted. Literature searches were conducted up to April 2021 in the Web of Sicence, Pubmed, Cochrane, Embase and Scopus databases. The search query was: (("game*" OR "exergame*") AND ("rehabilitation") AND ("remote" OR "telerehabilitation" OR "telemedicine")). We have selected a total of fourteen studies. We found five types of frameworks: Client-Server, Web-Based, Layers, Cloud Based and Multi users. We identified that it may be advantageous to mix the features of these frameworks to have a cheaper home-based system and prevent the patient from having to purchase more powerful computers. In addition, there are some challenges that need to be studied that will also help reduce costs for the patient: 1) Reduce the need for high processing of exergames on the patient's computer; 2) Prevent the patient from having to purchase expensive external devices for motion tracking.

Investigating the User Experience of Virtual Reality Rehabilitation Solution for Biomechatronics Laboratory and Home Environment

Virtual reality (VR) technology is a promising tool in physical rehabilitation. Research indicates that VR-supported rehabilitation is beneficial for task-specific training, multi-sensory feedback, diversified rehabilitation tasks, and patient motivation. Our first goal was to create a biomechatronics laboratory with a VR setup for increasing immersion and a motion platform to provide realistic feedback to patients. The second goal was to investigate possibilities to replicate features of the biomechatronics laboratory in a home-based training system using commercially available components. The laboratory comprises of a motion platform with 6-degrees-of-freedom (Rexroth eMotion), fitted with a load cell integrated treadmill, and an Oculus Quest virtual reality headset. The load cells provide input for data collection, as well as VR motion control. The home-based rehabilitation system consists of a Nintendo Wii Balance Board and an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset. User studies in the laboratory and home environment used direct observation techniques and self-reported attitudinal research methods to assess the solution’s usability and user experience. The findings indicate that the proposed VR solution is feasible. Participants using the home-based system experienced more cybersickness and imbalance compared to those using the biomechatronics laboratory solution. Future studies will look at a setup that is safe for first patient studies, and exercises to improve diagnosis of patients and progress during rehabilitation.

Effectiveness of a home-based telerehabilitation system in patients after total hip arthroplasty: study protocol of a randomized controlled trial

BackgroundThe demand for total hip arthroplasty (THA) is quickly rising given the escalating global incidence of hip osteoarthritis, and it is widely accepted that the post-surgery rehabilitation is key to optimize outcomes. The overall objective of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of a new telerehabilitation solution, ReHub, for the physical function and clinical outcome improvement following THA. The specific aims of this manuscript are to describe the study design, protocol, content of interventions, and primary and secondary outcomes and to discuss the clinical rehabilitation impact of the expected experimental results.Methods/designThis prospective, randomized, controlled, parallel-group trial will include 56 patients who had undergone primary THA. Patients are randomized to a control group (standard rehabilitation during the 2-week stay in the rehabilitation clinic followed by 3 weeks of unsupervised home-based rehabilitation) or an experimental group (standard rehabilitation during the 2-week stay in the rehabilitation clinic followed by 3 weeks of home-based ReHub-assisted telerehabilitation). The primary outcome is physical performance assessed through the Timed Up-and-Go (TUG) test. Secondary outcomes include independence level, pain intensity, hip disability, hip range of motion, muscle strength, and patient’s perception of clinical improvement.DiscussionProving the clinical and cost-effectiveness of a home-based telerehabilitation program for physical and muscle function following THA could support its systematic incorporation in post-surgical rehabilitation protocols, which should be tailored to the individual and collective needs.Trial registrationClinicalTrial.gov NCT04176315. Registered on 22 November 2019

Facile and simultaneous separation of nitrogen, phosphorus and bacteria from urine by using ash depth filters which harvest ammonium and phosphate as Struvite Enriched Ash

Abstract Ash depth filters were developed which can simultaneously remove nitrogen, phosphorus and bacteria from human waste streams while simultaneously maintaining a flow rate which is acceptable for domestic use processing urine from one individual for 1 month if the filter bed has a volume of approximately 3 l. Nitrogen and phosphorus depletion is achieved by the formation of Struvite Enriched Ash, which can subsequently be used as a slow-release garden fertilizer. Depth filtration and sanitation by high pH removed all detectable bacteria from this home-based system.

Development and evaluation of a cardiac coherence index for sleep analysis

Cardiac coherence measurement is an established technology in biofeedback systems for stress release. Studies have typically been conducted with participants during ordinary waking consciousness, yet cardiac coherence during sleep may be even more important in illness prevention and health promotion. We investigated whether it was possible to develop an alternative effective technology: the Cardiac Coherence Index (CCI), for sleep analysis. The CCI is based on heart inter-beat interval spectral entropy and autonomic nervous system resonance analysis. We tested the hypothesis that the CCI could be a way to assess sleep quality and eventually as a tool to assess consciousness states during sleep. Our analysis suggests that high CCI corresponds to deep sleep stage, low CCI to awake state, and medium CCI to dream state. These findings further suggest that the CCI method is potentially a useful tool for the study of consciousness and as a home-based system for sleep management.

The Practical Logic and Countermeasures of Community Home-based Elderly Care Service Under the Dimension of Innovative Big Data

Under the background of accelerating the integrative development of big data technology, fiscal finance, and public services to the community home-based care industry model, with the continuous acceleration of China’s social aging process, the government uses public finance to provide a basic community home care services for elderly residents. This paper analyzes the development status of community home care services, analyzes the root sources of the problems on insufficient supply, imbalance and unequalization of care services caused by China's financial system, and proposes a reasonable division of financial and administrative rights for community home care services, optimize the expenditure structure of public finance for community home-based elderly care, improve the use efficiency of financial funds for community home-based elderly care services, effectively supervise financial transfer payments, introduce the market mechanism to cultivate the policies and suggestions of the market main body of community home-based elderly care services. The state formulates fiscal policies and laws and regulations to strongly support the construction of community home-based care services. Promote the fiscal system reform of community elderly care service industry and cultivate the market main body of community home-based elderly care service. Develop a professional, branded and chained community home-based care service system, accelerate the healthy development of community home-based elderly care, and achieve good elderly care.

Toward Wearable Healthcare: A Miniaturized 3D Imager With Coherent Frequency-Domain Photoacoustics.

Medical monitoring is undergoing a translation from the hospital-based system to the personalized home-based system. With the aim of wearable application of photoacoustic technique, we propose a miniaturized photoacoustic 3D imager for superficial medical imaging. By employing the compact continuous-wave laser diode based optical irradiation and an ultrathin 2D matrix array based photoacoustic detection in the coherent frequency domain, a wearable imaging probe with a size of about 80 × 25 × 24mm3 and a weight of 21 g is developed. At the backend, an FPGA controlled Howland current source drives the laser diodes to excite linear frequency modulated optical irradiation. Recorded by a portable multichannel data acquisition system, the generated photoacoustic responses are firstly compressed with the coherent frequency domain photoacoustic method and then extrapolated in the wavenumber-frequency domain for fast image reconstruction. With three-wavelength (450nm, 638nm, and 808nm) laser irradiation, photoacoustic imaging can be operated multispectrally, endowing the developed imager with functional imaging capability in 3D space. With the imager worn on the human forearm, hemoglobin oxygen saturation level in superficial arm vasculature can be long-term monitored with high stability. When the imager is applied for imaging in a relatively large area (e.g., early melanoma detection in the human breast), flexible scanning in a handheld manner can be performed. This work opens the application potential of photoacoustic technique in a broad range of areas, including personalized healthcare, home health monitoring, and long-term physiologic monitoring.

A home-based tele-rehabilitation system for stroke patients exploiting magneto-inertial measurement units

A home-based tele-rehabilitation system for stroke patients exploiting magneto-inertial measurement units

WITHDRAWN: A home-based tele-rehabilitation system for stroke patients exploiting magneto-inertial measurement units

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A Smart Home System for Information Sharing, Health Assessments, and Medication Self-Management for Older People: Protocol for a Mixed-Methods Study.

BackgroundOlder adults often want to stay in a familiar place, such as their home, as they get older. This so-called aging in place, which may involve support from relatives or care professionals, can promote older people’s independence and well-being. The combination of aging and disease, however, can lead to complex medication regimes and difficulties for care providers in correctly assessing the older person's health. In addition, the organization of health care is fragmented, which makes it difficult for health professionals to encourage older people to participate in their own care. It is also a challenge to perform adequate health assessments and to engage in appropriate communication between health care professionals.ObjectiveThe purpose of this paper is to describe the design for an integrated home-based system that can acquire and compile health-related evidence for guidance and information-sharing among care providers and care receivers in order to support and promote medication self-management among older people.MethodsThe authors used a participatory design approach for this mixed-methods project, which was divided into four phases. Phase I, Conceptualization, consists of the conceptualization of a system to support medication self-management, objective health assessments, and communication between health care professionals. Phase II, Development of a System, consists of building and bringing together the conceptualized systems from Phase I. Phase III, Pilot Study, and Phase IV, Full-Scale Intervention, are described briefly.ResultsParticipants in Phase I were people who were involved in some way in the care of older adults and included older adults themselves, relatives of older adults, care professionals, and industrial partners. With input from Phase I participants, we identified two relevant concepts for promoting medication self-management, both of which related to systems that participants believed could provide guidance for the older adults themselves, relatives of older adults, and care professionals. The systems will also encourage information-sharing between care providers and care receivers. The first is the concept of the Intelligent Age-Friendly Home (IAFH), defined as an integrated residential system that evolves to sense, reason, and act in response to individuals’ needs, preferences, and behaviors as these change over time. The second concept is the Medication safety, Objective assessments of health-related behaviors, and Personalized medication reminders (MedOP) system, a system that would be supported by the IAFH, and which consists of three related components: one that assesses health behaviors, another that communicates health data, and a third that promotes medication self-management.ConclusionsThe participants in this project were older adults, relatives of older adults, care professionals, and our industrial partners. With input from the participants, we identified two main concepts that could comprise a system for health assessment, communication, and medication self-management: the IAFH and the MedOP system. These concepts will be tested in this study to determine whether they can facilitate and promote medication self-management among older people.International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID)DERR1-10.2196/12447

Feasibility of Home-Based Automated Assessment of Postural Instability and Lower Limb Impairments in Parkinson's Disease.

A self-managed, home-based system for the automated assessment of a selected set of Parkinson’s disease motor symptoms is presented. The system makes use of an optical RGB-Depth device both to implement its gesture-based human computer interface and for the characterization and the evaluation of posture and motor tasks, which are specified according to the Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS). Posture, lower limb movements and postural instability are characterized by kinematic parameters of the patient movement. During an experimental campaign, the performances of patients affected by Parkinson’s disease were simultaneously scored by neurologists and analyzed by the system. The sets of parameters which best correlated with the UPDRS scores of subjects’ performances were then used to train supervised classifiers for the automated assessment of new instances of the tasks. Results on the system usability and the assessment accuracy, as compared to clinical evaluations, indicate that the system is feasible for an objective and automated assessment of Parkinson’s disease at home, and it could be the basis for the development of neuromonitoring and neurorehabilitation applications in a telemedicine framework.

基于区块链技术的居家养老生态体系探究

基于区块链技术的居家养老生态体系探究