mPCA – A Mobile Patient Care-Giving Assistant for Alzheimer Patients

The use of pervasive computing elements such as java smart phones and multi-modal sensors in smart homes of the future can potentially assist patients with Moderate Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). The utility of this technology particularly in the elderly group of patients is currently hoped to reduce the huge economic toll on the ailing Medicaid system. We present an ongoing research project whose goal is to create a cognitive assistant to improve the independence of home-bound AD patients. We present the architecture of the Mobile Patient Care-Giving Assistant (mPCA), which integrates local-positioning systems, J2MEbased smart phones as well as other wireless and visual sensors. The mPCA system is targeted towards AD patients in their early to moderate stages of the disease (Global Deterioration Scale, or GDS = 4 or 5). Introduction Alzheimer disease is a dementing disorder, characterized by cognitive and behavioral problems. It involves the damage, breakdown of connections, and death of the brain cells. It affects the parts of the brain that control memory, thought, and language. It usually begins at age 60. Some of the signs include loss of memory, difficulty with abstract thinking, disorientation, loss of judgment, and personality changes. It progresses from mild to moderate to severe. People with mild AD can usually live alone. People with moderate AD may have great difficulty functioning without supervision. People with severe AD can no longer take care of themselves (2000 Progress Report on Alzheimer’s disease).Until a cure is found, people with Alzheimer’s disease need care-giving. According to the director of University of Florida’s Institute on Aging, 1 in 10 elders (4 millions) suffer from AD. It is also estimated that 1 in 5 elders will have AD by 2050. Also, a study made at the University of Pennsylvania, estimates that in 2002 AD will cost American businesses more than $61B [3]. This cost is broken down as follow: The cost of family care-giving including absenteeism, productivity losses, and replacement losses ($ 36.5 billion). The business share of health and long term care expenditures ($ 24.6 billion). * This research is supported by an RERC grant from the Department of Education and the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research. One of the goals of the Alzheimer’s Association is to reverse this course by providing support for family caregivers to release them from the overwhelming load they face with their family and employer [4]. At the University of Florida RERC center we are exploring the use of pervasive and wireless technology to create a mobile patient caregiver assistant (mPCA). Our goal is to create a tool to reduce the caregiver load, therefore decreasing the cost of family care-giving. The mPCA assistant is a smart phone that interacts with a set of sensors in a smart space, in which most of the computation, decisions, and events take place. This tool will benefit the patients, assisting them to overcome difficulties in carrying out daily activities by means of reminders, orientation, and context-sensitive teaching, and monitoring. Related Technology In-door Tracking system. mPCA is based on an ultrasonic indoor tracking system, already implemented in an elder house model at the CISE department of the University of Florida. It operates in the ultrasonic range (40 KHz). The system, shown in Figure 1, consists of: (1) four fixed devices (known as pilots or monitors) located in each corner of each room in the house, and (2) two moving devices (known as tags or beacons), which are placed in the shoulder blades of a light-weight “net” vest worn by the elder. The four pilots acts as receivers that receive signals from the beacons. The position of the beacons is calculated based on the two shortest times that the ultrasonic waves take from the beacon to the pilots and a trilateration technique (see line labeled 1 and 2 in Figure 1). By using two beacons, the system not only is able to detect the position of the elder, but also his/her orientation. Other related technologies include smart phones and other sensors, but we do not see it necessary to report on those technologies in this short paper. 6 ft. x 6 ft. Elder Monitor A