Kinect Used To Help Detect Increased Fall Risk In Elderly Patients

Researchers at Missouri University are using Microsoft's 3D depth sensing Kinect to help gauge changes in behavior that could indicate increased risk of a fall in elderly patients. In a trial that placed the Kinect around the living quarters of residents at Columbia, Missouri's TigerPlace independent living community, researchers were able to unobtrusively observe and detect changes in residents' walking speed and general behavior that could indicate an increased risk for falls or illness. "We know from the research that we can pick things up ten days to two weeks before critical health change events happen," University of Missourri nursing professor Marilyn Rantz said in a video describing the effort. Besides providing data in a form that's easy for the computer to analyze, the Kinect also has the added benefit of removing potential privacy concerns raised by traditional camera monitoring. "The Kinect uses infrared light to create a depth image that produces data in the form of a silhouette, instead of a video or photograph,” doctoral student Erik Stone said in a statement. "This alleviates many seniors' concerns about privacy when traditional web camera-based monitoring systems are used." The full paper describing the system, Evaluation of an Inexpensive Depth Camera for Passive In-Home Fall Risk Assessment [PDF], recently won the best paper award at Dublin's Pervasive Health Conference.