Longitudinal residential ambient monitoring: Correlating sensor data to functional health status

Wireless sensor networks are becoming popular in the field of ambient assisted living. In this paper we report our study on the relationship between a functional health metric and features derived from the sensor data. Sensor systems are installed in the houses of nine people who are also quarterly visited by an occupational therapist for functional health assessments. Different features are extracted and these are correlated with a metric of functional health (the AMPS motor). Though the sample is small, the results indicate that some features are better in describing the functional health in the population, but individual differences should also be taken into account when developing a sensor system for functional health assessment.