Department of Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada.
School of Public Health Sciences, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada.
Sensors (Basel). 2022 Dec 21;23(1):71. doi: 10.3390/s23010071.
This paper presents a novel hallway gait extraction system that enables an individual's spatiotemporal gait parameter extraction at each gait cycle using a single FMCW (Frequency Modulated Continuous Wave) radar. The purpose of the proposed system is to detect changes in gait that may be the signs of changes in mobility, cognition, and frailty, particularly for older adults in retirement homes. We believe that one of the straightforward applications for gait monitoring using radars is in corridors and hallways, which are commonly available in most retirement and long-term care homes. To achieve in-corridor coverage, we designed an in-package hyperbola-based lens antenna integrated with a radar module package empowered by our fast and easy-to-implement gait extraction method. We validated system functionality by capturing spatiotemporal gait values (e.g., speed, step points, step time, step length, and step count) of people walking in a hallway. The results achieved in this work pave the way to explore the use of stand-alone radar-based sensors in long hallways in retirement apartment buildings or individual's homes for use in day-to-day long-term monitoring of gait parameters of older adults.
本文提出了一种新颖的走廊步态提取系统，该系统使用单个 FMCW（调频连续波）雷达在每个步态周期实现个体的时空步态参数提取。该系统的目的是检测步态的变化，这些变化可能是移动性、认知能力和虚弱程度变化的迹象，特别是对于养老院中的老年人。我们认为，使用雷达进行步态监测的一种直接应用是在走廊和大厅中，这些地方在大多数养老院和长期护理院中都很常见。为了实现走廊内的覆盖，我们设计了一种基于封装内双曲线的透镜天线，该天线与我们的快速且易于实现的步态提取方法相结合，由雷达模块封装。我们通过捕获在走廊中行走的人的时空步态值（例如，速度、步点、步时、步长和步数）来验证系统功能。这项工作的结果为探索在养老院公寓楼或个人住宅的长走廊中使用独立的基于雷达的传感器来日常长期监测老年人的步态参数铺平了道路。
