Sunday, 27 November 2016

Week 4 [28.11-4.12.2016] SmartMirror: An Embedded Non-contact System for Health Monitoring at Home

Hi,
I would like to present you an article about smart home system. In this particular case, authors have presented their approach to monitoring our health by using the smart mirror. Even though, they are trying to monitor our key physiological markers. We can argue about their choice, maybe these markers are too basic, maybe they are not so important for our life. However, I consider their approach as a start for something bigger. Let's consider a situation, when you are waking up, looking in the mirror and know that there is something wrong with your body.
Maybe, this is just another "smart" device we can brag we have, but we are not using it like we should. Most of the time we know that we are not feeling well, without looking at these markers and so on. Maybe, it can save someone's life. Who knows?

Take a look at the article and try to answer questions below.

  • Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
  • Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
  • Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?

      28 comments:

      1. Have you ever thought about making your smart home?
        I thought, but more in terms of temperature, closed windows, power consumption.
        Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        Everything that helps to man is good, I think that is the future, especially in fast-notification example of heart attacks.
        Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        No.

        ReplyDelete
      2. * Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        Yes of course. I love smart houses and the possibilities are limitless. With some knowledge about Arduino we can do basically everything that pops up in our mind. I love the most the idea of using app for settings of whole house - the lighting, connecting devices so I know if something is broken or I can start my laundry remotely. I love opening locks in doors from the app and the security cameras when we are not in home.

        * Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?

        It is something called telemedicine and from one point of view it is all about gaining money from people who care a lot of health especially from the elderly people, but from the other hand it might be life saver. I wish that we can easily check out heart rate and blood pressure to prevent strokes. The same with glucose level for diabetes. There is a lot of diseases that require permanent monitoring and some devices can help a lot.

        * Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?

        No but I would like to have Heart Rate monitoring. I heard that it is very good device for those that have many stressful situations in live and that it helps with monitoring your pulse and lowering it when it is needed.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Thanks for the replay. If you know how to develop software, you can probably build anything from scratch. Windows 10 IoT is quite nice, Arduino should work as well.
          In my honest opinion best "cheap" heart rate monitoring equipment is https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/shop-by-accessories/fitness-sensors/heart-rate-monitor/prod10996.html

          Delete
      3. • Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
        Yes, I did. I always wanted to have a smart home. However I have never thought about health monitoring at home. It of course may be a feature of smart home but I rather thought about Internet of Things as the elements of a smart home.
        • Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        I’m convinced that smart health monitoring is a future. Especially because of its simplicity and as well functionality. If this invention will be enhanced with new features it may save someone’s life or can at least diagnose some diseases.
        • Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        Unfortunately I don’t have such devices but I really would like to have.

        ReplyDelete
      4. 1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        I am currently in the process of implementing smart home features at my mansion. Particularly, I am mostly focused on monitoring the neighbourhood area of my home, to identify potential burglars and automatically ring the security service. I am also planning to enhance the smart home elements such as distant steering of light and temperature and going forward once the technology will be widespread I will equip myself with IoT fridge that I hope will do the shopping on my behalf.

        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        I don’t think that smart health monitoring is a future. In my opinion it is presence. Let’s consider our smartphones or less common smartwatches and take a moment to think – how many of them do not monitor health these days? Probably only the very basic gadgets, but majority is constantly monitoring our heartbeat, blood pressure, how many steps we did during the day etc. Recently, newspapers reported about the add in to Xbox, that would automatically call the doctor in case of identification potential health problem. We live in the era of big data, with health data inclusively, therefore I think that this is a presence.

        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        Just iPhone, which monitor my heartbeat, steps and suggest how many hours shall I sleep (which btw I never adhere to, since I prefer to spend nights blogging in English :-) )

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Spending nights on blogging is admirable :)
          Are you planing to build something on your own on Raspberry?

          Delete
      5. Hi,
        I have thought about making my home smart but I haven't considered it an idea worth the cost.
        Regarding health monitoring devices I think that it is not as innovative as it seems. It's just technology and miniaturization that makes it affordable and available to masses. On the other hand I think that some of those miniature devices are not as precise as their full-sized equivalents.
        Referring to the article you posted there are many fields in which technology can help in non-contact diagnosis of various diseases, e.g. a research on diagnosing neurodegeneration (Parkinsson's disease) from eye movement.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Actually, Parkinsson's disease is a good example. From what I know, if you start fighting with it at the early stage it could be managable. Good point.

          Delete
      6. Hey, thanks for bringing up this subject. It reminded my a bit of the Japanese smart toilets that analyse the fluids people release and can diagnose certain illnesses. ;)
        1. Currently that would require too much effort, money, time and planning so I don't really think about it as I am ok with the simplicity of my current home-living.
        2. I think most areas of our life will be automated in the future so yes.
        3. Nothing extraordinarily other than a weight that remembers your previous measurement if you would consider that smart. ;)

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. When I was in Japan I was amazed, how interactive their toilets can be. Have you read http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/04/toto_washlet_s350e_the_incredible_japanese_wonder_toilet_that_will_change.html ? :D

          Delete
      7. Thank you for very refreshing article. Really interesting.

        1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        I can't see any connection to the article, but I think I would love to use technologies that actually help. Provided that "smart" equipment manufacturer won't trace my every move, like Google does.

        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?

        I surely hope for it. Right now I am faced with regime of routine blood pressure measurement. I would be very grateful for non-contact blood pressure monitor. However, it would have to be much more precise than just "your blood pressure is high, medium, low". I have to know exact numbers.

        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?

        Unfortunately no. The only "smart" component I have is a smartphone application I use to register blood pressure and heart rate.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. From what I know, a smart mirror can be a part of smart home. In this particular case a smart bathroom or something like that.

          Delete
      8. 1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
        Yes of course. As I mention above I would like to control my heating system and be able to adjust temperature remotely in my house.
        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        A team of researchers from MIT has developed a wireless sensing technology called Vital-Radio that can ambiently monitor breathing and heart rate. A Vital-Radio device can be implanted in the walls of smart homes to keep track of inhabitants' health in real time. It could potentially benefit any member of a household, but the implications for being able to monitor babies or elderly relatives as they are sleeping are particularly compelling.
        As with all potential smart home technologies, I have concerns about the security risks that Vital-Radio would leave users open to. Nevertheless, it is one of the first examples I have seen of technology that we would passively interact with every day, being embedded into our environment -- and no doubt it won't be the last.
        Source: Future homes will ambiently monitor breathing and heart rate (http://www.wired.co.uk/article/smart-home-monitor-breathing-heart-rate)
        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        I am using a heart-rate monitor as a helpful tool in training. Tracking my heart rate with a monitor (which reads your pulse via a sensor built into a chest strap) tells me precisely how hard—or easy—your heart is working. Measuring my heart rate helps me keep from making one of the most common mistakes that runners of all abilities make—running too fast too often, which puts me at risk for injury and burnout.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Thank you for the link. It looks promising. I'm looking forward to buy something like that in a reasonable price.

          Delete
      9. 1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
        Maybe partly? I was never a fan of having all the "smart-stuff", Of course, some features are very useful or at least fun to have. But the thing with technology is that sometimes it just fails, errors happen. Imagine that some module responsible for the temperature breaks down. It would make sense to have some back up, "non-smart", device (heater for example). On the other hand having both might be expensive in the end.

        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        I sure hope so. There are many diseases that need frequent monitoring and something like this would make life of people affected by the diseases way easier.

        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        I don't use any special devices. If I need anything like that I can always visit Google Play and find some helpful app. For example I do use a pedometer app, which helps me to control the number of steps I do everyday.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Pedometer can be useful, do you have any targets? Like doing 10 thousand steps per day or something like that?

          Delete
      10. Yes finally something similar with my research area.

        1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
        Yes, when I was buidling my home I was thinking about it. But I must say that security of this kind of solutions is preposterous. I am saying about whole area commercial and open source. If you don't want your neighbour to change your life with his mobile phone don't use smart bulbs. :-).

        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        Yes, but you have to know that this is quite old area and now you have got medical solutions that monitors your health etc. Another thing is that, that this is very expensive solution.

        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        No I don't have any health monitoring device (like mobile Holter etc). But I own couple of smartbands for experiments.

        If you want to do research in this area, be careful with your topic.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. Good to know :)
          I'm going to try mess with my neighbor bulbs on my own :D
          Sadly, I've Philips lights in my house. Probably, I need to reconsider my own security :)

          Delete
      11. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        Yes I have, but not in the context mentioned in article. Yes I have, but not in the context mentioned in an article. Smart house will give me additional possibilities to become lazier ;). A context of smart house that I consider to implement is automation and IoT. You don't have to worry e.g did you switch off iron or did you lock the doors while you are outside. You can manage it remotely or setup the special rules that will do that automatically.


        Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?

        No, I don’t because this kind of software already exists. It is solution that can help older person to call help when it is alone at home. Unfortunately it is not so popular yet.


        Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?

        You can find this kind of software in mobile devices, which are connected with smart bands or smart watches.

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. I know that it exists, but I'm waiting for the moment it will be cheap enough for elder people. This is the target, moving from laboratories and trying to popularize it.

          Delete
      12. Hello, thanks for this interesting article.
        Have you ever thought about making your home smart?
        Yes, I 've thought about making my home smart, however, not in the terms presented in this article. Heating, lighting regulation are the thing I am planning to implement in the nearest future. Security issues are becoming a standard. IoT offers new possibilities which are worth a consideration.
        Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        For me, It is really hard to say that. I have not seen any real scientific research regarding these issues. However, I think that it might be helpful. There many things we do not notice like the condition of your skin and cancerous changes.
        Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        No, I don't. I don't have time to use and analyze the outputs as well as react. Without the usage of any device I am aware that I don't sleep well so what's the point?

        ReplyDelete
        Replies
        1. So true, we know when we are sleepy or could sleep at least an hour longer. It's more about predicting certain diseases or abnormal behavior, instead of just saying you haven't slept long enough. Go to sleep.

          Delete
      13. I belive in future a Home Health Monitoring are going to develop rapidly but I doubt that presented idea in this artilce are promising. Home Health Monitoring will be more aforable for many people and collect either huge amount useful and redundant information about our health. Do I make my home smart? I think rather not in near future. I prefer make all diagnosis on my health without artificial equipment for now. But I am going to watch this devices improvement.

        ReplyDelete
      14. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        Not so much. In some aspects it may be useful (like controlling the temperature at home), but I didn't think about more advanced features. Maybe when I'll buy a bigger house I'll consider to make it smart ;)

        Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?

        Yes, it is a future for sure. This year I was at the conference about Telemedicine and there were few presentations about health monitoring at home. For example the patients with the heart issues that needs to have pacemaker also get the monitoring device that sends patient's heart's results to the doctor. The other idea that was mentioned was about measuring the basic life parameter of the patient with a smartband.

        Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?

        I don't have such device, but I consider to buy a smartband :)

        ReplyDelete
      15. 1. Have you ever thought about making your home smart?

        Yes, I was thinking about it, but propably I'll never implement smart technologies into my homeplace. Of course, I'd like to automate things, like watering the grass or other regular things which need to be done repeatedly, but I don't see a point in automating windows or coffee machine. Conversely, I see a potential in smartness of buildings which are not houses. But I guess that's a topic for another discussion.

        2. Do you think smart health monitoring is a future?
        Oh yes, definitely. I didn't know about it until I read the article. "Smart mirror" has a future in my opinion. Besides people who are obsessed about their heatlh, it can be very helpful for people who have some protracted illsness. Maybe in the future, when the technology will be cheaper, almost everyone would be able to monitor their health.

        3. Do you have any kind of smart health monitoring devices?
        No, but I heard some smartphones have some technology to monitor your health somehow.

        ReplyDelete
      16. Thank you for interesting article. Intelligent solutions are very cool but there are still safety issues. At present, the IoT - this is very poorly protected area. People should be very careful because sometimes - for example, monitoring of our house can be used for thieves. Regarding the use of intelligent solutions for health monitoring - I do not have any device of this type. They are very helpful when it comes to monitoring health of children and seniors. If we think of the economically active then here is a few problems - because the data about our health are very interested in our employer, insurer, etc ...

        ReplyDelete