Physical Activity Monitoring for Aging People. Objectives Monitoring of physical activities is a growing field with many diverse applications in the area of Ambient Assisted Living, ranging from medical screening, disorder diagnosis, rehabilitation, to well-being. A balanced physical activity is essential for “well aging”, and represents a fundamental indicator of good health and life quality. It is well-known that physical activity plays a positive role against Chronic Conditions, and more precisely, stimulates the immune system, decreases depressive state, reduces muscle loosening, activates the bone remodelling, and reduces the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Moreover, it is an excellent factor for the functional rehabilitation process. In advanced clinical cases, physical activity becomes vital, and patients must, for example, walk or change their posture in bed at regular time intervals. Current monitoring systems are rather costly, require wires or special infrastructure, and are rather dedicated to motion analysis than to capturing musculoskeletal efforts and activities. The objective of this project is to develop PAMAP, an unobtrusive and fully mobile system that will enable the accurate monitoring of the physical activities of aging people. The system will base on a set of tiny MEMS sensor units and corresponding software for professional and private use. It will rely on a sound biomechanical model of the human body, and it will accurately measure the motion and efforts of the upper and lower limbs, thanks to appropriate parameterization. The system will be usable indoors and outdoors, and will enable monitoring of users during their daily activities. It will be modular and will cover a bunch of applications ranging from well-being to patient monitoring. Significant efforts will be put not only on the usability and acceptance of the devices itself, but also on the User Interface that will, in an entertaining and motivating way, accompany the user during the day, and enable reviewing and sharing of the recorded activity measurements with physicians, family members, or friends, for medical supervision or private purposes. For more deatails please see PAMAP website
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