HEALTHSONAR project is aiming to develop a device based on ultra-low energy radio (UWB) technology to monitor sleep, gate and main indoor activity including falls. All those aspects of daily life are very crucial for the Quality of Life of several group of people including elders, patients with sleep disorders, patients with Parkinson, Multiple sclerosis and other movement disorders. The device is able to monitor both “low” (thorax and abdomen motion for heart rate and respiration) and “high” (walking) motion based on different transmission settings. The device works as an IoT device transmitting the data directly to the HEALTHSONAR cloud application where personalized machine learning methods are used to analyses user’s sleep phases and disorders. It can also be connected to the HEALTHSONAR mobile app to transmit data in real time for monitoring physiological signals such as respiration and heart rate, gait or activity measures, providing feedback to users.
The operation of the HealthSonar device is based on three levels:
HealthSonar aims to detect different types of movement such as micro-movements, medium-distance movements and longer-distance movements. Micro-movements at close range contribute to the study of respiration and heart rate on which sleep analysis is based.
Medium distance movements with good accuracy help in the study of gait based on clinical tests (Timed 25 feet, Walk feet) and free gait. Finally, longer distance movements with lower resolution provide data for the study of falls and activity when the user is in specific areas.
