Using mobile sensors to record details about physical and mental activity may be a useful way to monitor senior citizens' health, according to a pilot study by Dartmouth Medical School professor Ethan Berke. Changes in everyday behaviors can potentially predict health problems, such as dementia or depression, the study found.
Eight patients with an average age of 85 wore the two-inch sensors on their waists for 10 days, according to U.S. News and World Report. The sensors continuously recorded data on physical activity, such as time spent walking, sitting, standing and speaking with other people.
The data indicated that men spent 21.3 percent of their time walking and 64.4 percent stationary, while women spent 20.7 percent of their time walking and 62 percent stationary. Time spent on social interactions was used to gauge mental health.
Participants were required to complete four questionnaires on "health, physical activity, depression and friendship" which were then compared with the information recorded by the sensor, U.S. News reported. The sensor data was consistent with the results of the questionnaires, though Berke told U.S. News that a "much larger, more robust" study must be conducted to establish how strongly the results are correlated.
The pilot study, however, could have important implications for future medical technology because smart phones could be outfitted to monitor physical activity and social interactions, according U.S. News.
If sensors were added to cell phones, the resulting data could be linked with patients' electronic health records to provide medical professionals with an objective source of information about a patient's health, said Berke, who is also the director of the Population Health Research Center at the Dartmouth Institute for Healthy Policy and Clinical Practice. This type of information would eliminate bias and recall problems some people can display when answering surveys or self-reporting their activities, he said.
The sensors could be also used by non-elderly patients, according to Berke.
"It's an easy jump to imagine other populations using this as well," he said.
While the devices add important objective information to a patient's medical record, several concerns remain about the new information that the study presented. Gisele Wolf-Klein, director of geriatric education at North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, told U.S. News that the small number of patients used in Berke's study make it difficult to provide recommendations about the use of the sensors.
"I think it's an interesting technology to see what kind of factors might influence overall quality of life," Wolf-Klein told U.S. News. "I would certainly question their attempt. I'm not sure you could statistically interpret this extremely small number."
Although the eight patients reported that the free-standing sensor used in the study was not difficult to use, they described the surveys as "inconvenient and difficult" to fill out, U.S. News reported.
Berke, who is lead author of the study, co-authored the report with professor of computer science Tanzeem Choudhury, Shahid Ali '12 and Mashfiqui Rabbi Adv'14. The study was published in the July/August issue of Annals of Family Medicine."
