Indoor RFID gait monitoring system for fall detection

Due to home accidents occurring within the world´s aging population, especially with the accidental stumble and falling of the elderly, mortality and morbidity from falls have become one of the major issues in the health care system. In most developed countries, most frequent stumbles and falls occur in and around the community or at home. A number of wearable devices integrated with accelerometers have been tested to detect accidental stumbles and falls. Of those tested using waist or chest-attached devices, however, were not only user unfriendly but also deficient in 100% detection accuracy. In this paper, a RFID-based gait monitoring system (RGMS) is proposed, which helps caregivers detect stumbles and falls of the elderly without any restriction to time and place. The proposed RGMS consists of a pair of slippers with a dual band RFID module, several readers and a computing system. The RGMS provides quantitative and graphical feedback to caregivers for gait monitoring and the assessment of gait abnormality by tracking the elder´s cadence, stride length, and gait. This gait tracking system is responsive, accurate, and most of all user friendly.