Advanced Sensors for Supportive Environments for the Elderly

Summary of Project

This two-year, EPSRC-funded project will undertake research into monitored supportive environments for the elderly and disabled living alone. In particular it will investigate the applicability and feasibility of various levels of automatic monitoring using intelligent visual sensors. It will identify the requirements of users of supportive home environments. These include occupants, family members, and professional carers. The project will build and evaluate a prototype monitoring system to demonstrate the technological feasibility of the proposed approach. The prototype demonstrator along with the requirements and design guidelines produced by this study are intended to ‘lay the foundations’ for subsequent development

Objectives

1. Prototype Demonstrator

• To develop computer vision systems that can monitor a person in their home environment.
• To decide the appropriate level of monitoring and resulting relevant action.
• To track the occupant automatically, and identify significant events in their home context e.g. inactivity, falls.

2. Requirements & Guidelines

· To assess requirements of users (occupants, carers and family).

· To produce a documented methodology for drama-based scenarios.

· To investigate the acceptability and usability of various levels and forms of intervention in the home.