Life expectancy in most countries has been increasing continually over the several few decades thanks to significant improvements in medicine, public health, as well as personal and environmental hygiene. However, increased life expectancy combined with falling birth rates are expected to engender a large aging demographic in the near future that would impose significant burdens on the socio-economic structure of these countries. Therefore, it is essential to develop cost-effective, easy-to-use systems for the sake of elderly healthcare and well-being. Remote health monitoring, based on non-invasive and wearable sensors, actuators and modern communication and information technologies offers an efficient and cost-effective solution that allows the elderly to continue to live in their comfortable home environment instead of expensive healthcare facilities. These systems will also allow healthcare personnel to monitor important physiological signs of their patients in real time, assess health conditions and provide feedback from distant facilities. In this paper, we have presented and compared several low-cost and non-invasive health and activity monitoring systems that were reported in recent years. A survey on textile-based sensors that can potentially be used in wearable systems is also presented. Finally, compatibility of several communication technologies as well as future perspectives and research challenges in remote monitoring systems will be discussed.

Wearable Sensors for Remote Health Monitoring.

Current wireless technologies, such as wireless body area networks and wireless personal area networks, provide promising applications in medical monitoring systems to measure specified physiological data and also provide location-based information, if required. With the increasing sophistication of wearable and implantable medical devices and their integration with wireless sensors, an ever-expanding range of therapeutic and diagnostic applications is being pursued by research and commercial organizations. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive review of recent developments in wireless sensor technology for monitoring behaviour related to human physiological responses. It presents background information on the use of wireless technology and sensors to develop a wireless physiological measurement system. A generic miniature platform and other available technologies for wireless sensors have been studied in terms of hardware and software structural requirements for a low-cost, low-power, non-invasive and unobtrusive system.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0967-3334/29/11/R01/pdf

Wireless body sensor networks for health-monitoring applications.

A mobile terminal including a display configured to display information; a short range communication module configured to exchange a signal with an external control device; and a controller configured to receive the signal from the external control device, determine a context at a timing point of receiving the signal, and control an operation corresponding to the signal to be performed in the determined context. Further, the operation includes at least one of activation/deactivation of the display, an activation/deactivation of a lock mode of the mobile terminal, a volume operation and a camera operation.

Mobile terminal and controlling method thereof

Muscles Alive: Their Functions Revealed by Electromyography

Integrating antennas into fabrics is a potential way for facilitating many applications, such as health monitoring of patients, fire-fighting, rescue work, and space and military personal communications. This paper studies possibilities to construct a flexible, lightweight and mechanically robust textile antenna for dual-band satellite use: Iridium and GPS. Different textile materials were characterized and the most promising materials were used to design, construct, and test a rectangular patch antenna. The gain and axial ratio for both bands is compliant with specifications and relatively stable under most bending conditions. The developed antenna solution allows integration into clothing.

Wearable Circularly Polarized Antenna for Personal Satellite Communication and Navigation

The paper presents a compact planar antenna designed for wireless sensors intended for healthcare applications. Antenna performance is investigated with regards to various parameters governing the overall sensor operation. The study illustrates the importance of including full sensor details in determining and analysing the antenna performance. A globally optimized sensor antenna shows an increase in antenna gain by 2.8 dB and 29% higher radiation efficiency in comparison to a conventional printed strip antenna. The wearable sensor performance is demonstrated and effects on antenna radiated power, efficiency and front to back ratio of radiated energy are investigated both numerically and experimentally. Propagation characteristics of the body-worn sensor to on-body and off-body base units are also studied. It is demonstrated that the improved sensor antenna has an increase in transmitted and received power, consequently sensor coverage range is extended by approximately 25%.

Numerical and Experimental Evaluation of a Compact Sensor Antenna for Healthcare Devices

Proximity sensor, particularly for usage in an electronic mobile device, comprising at least one acoustic transducer adapted for receiving acoustic signals at least in parts of the frequency range of human audible sound and emitting and/or receiving ultrasonic signals for proximity estimation The acoustic transducer preferably is a Micro-Electro-Mechanical-Systems (MEMS) microphone Further, a method in an electronic device comprising an acoustic transducer is provided comprising the steps of generating at least one electric signal in the frequency range of ultrasonic sound, emitting at least one ultrasonic signal by means of the acoustic transducer; receiving at least one ultrasonic signal by means of the acoustic transducer; deducing from the at least one emitted ultrasonic signal and the at least one received ultrasonic signal at least the delay between emission of the emitted ultrasonic signal and reception of the corresponding ultrasonic signal

Proximity sensor, in particular microphone for reception of sound signals in the human audible sound range, with ultrasonic proximity estimation

A modular application development platform for miniature wireless sensor/actuator devices called small autonomous network devices (SANDs) is described. As an application example a system power breakdown of a real-time ECG analysis is presented. The application development SANDs have a volume of about one cubic centimeter. Based upon testing and optimization the schematics and specifications are obtained for the mass-production SANDs. Utilizing system in package (SiP) technology the volume can be reduced up to five times. These devices can be used in a truly unnoticeable and unobtrusive way to serve as the smallest components of a personal health care monitoring system or an ambient intelligence system.

SAND: a modular application development platform for miniature wireless sensors

The quantification of the human perception of experiences can be achieved by the sensing of specific psychophysiological parameters. A growing interest develops for the daily life use of these quantification techniques by unobtrusive and unnoticeable data collection. Remote and non invasive sensing technologies are discussed for the sensing of the following psychophysiological parameters: heart rate variability, and muscle stress. A generic miniature platform for miniature wireless sensing applications is described as an important enabler for unobtrusive and unnoticeable sensing. The technology no longer seems to be a limiting factor for unobtrusive and unnoticeable sensing. Initially the sensors will be worn on the body, but ultimately implantable sensors will become widely accepted, allowing access to new parameters, such as hormone levels and body core temperature.

Frank Pasveer

Papers

Numerical and Experimental Evaluation of a Compact Sensor Antenna for Healthcare Devices

Proximity sensor, in particular microphone for reception of sound signals in the human audible sound range, with ultrasonic proximity estimation

SAND: a modular application development platform for miniature wireless sensors

Unobtrusive Sensing of Psychophysiological Parameters

Antennas for Wearable Devices