Smartphone-Based Solutions for Fall Detection and Prevention: Challenges and Open Issues

Sensors

Mohammad Ashfak Habib²  Mas S. Mohktar²  Shahrul Bahyah Kamaruzzaman¹  Kheng Seang Lim¹  Tan Maw Pin¹ 

[1] Centre for Innovation in Medical Engineering (CIME), Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; E-Mails:;Department of Biomedical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; E-Mails:

关键词: fall detection;    fall prevention;    smartphone;    ubiquitous computing;    pervasive computing;    elderly;   

DOI  :  10.3390/s140407181

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

This paper presents a state-of-the-art survey of smartphone (SP)-based solutions for fall detection and prevention. Falls are considered as major health hazards for both the elderly and people with neurodegenerative diseases. To mitigate the adverse consequences of falling, a great deal of research has been conducted, mainly focused on two different approaches, namely, fall detection and fall prevention. Required hardware for both fall detection and prevention are also available in SPs. Consequently, researchers' interest in finding SP-based solutions has increased dramatically over recent years. To the best of our knowledge, there has been no published review on SP-based fall detection and prevention. Thus in this paper, we present the taxonomy for SP-based fall detection and prevention solutions and systematic comparisons of existing studies. We have also identified three challenges and three open issues for future research, after reviewing the existing articles. Our time series analysis demonstrates a trend towards the integration of external sensing units with SPs for improvement in usability of the systems.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.