A dog's collar could help monitor the well-being of the elderly.
The wearable monitoring device uses motion detectors to track the dog's "barking, sitting, digging and other key canine [behaviors]," a Newcastle University press release reported. The device could sense if a the canine's behavior suddenly changed, which could be an indicator that their owner was in trouble.
"A lot of our research is focussed on developing intelligent systems that can help older people to live independently for longer," Doctor Cas Ladha, said. "But developing a system that reassures family and carers that an older relative is well without intruding on that individual's privacy is difficult. This is just the first step but the idea behind this research is that it would allow us to discretely support people without the need for cameras."
Dogs have long been considered "man's best friend," so they may be perfect candidates for the job of keeping out elderly safe.
"A dog's physical and emotional dependence on their owner means that their wellbeing is likely reflect that of their owner and any changes such as the dog being walked less often, perhaps not being fed regularly, or simply demonstrating 'unhappy' [behavior] could be an early indicator for families that an older relative needs help," Behaviour imaging expert Nils Hammerla, said.
The "hi-tech, waterproof dog collar complete with accelerometer and collected data for a wide range of dog breeds" was originally designed to monitor dogs that were regularly left alone for long periods of time.
"In order to set the benchmark we needed to determine which movements correlated to particular [behavior's], so in the initial studies, as well as the collars, we also set up cameras to record their [behavior]," Ladha said.
The researchers used data sets to program the collar to recognize 17 typical canine activities, such as: "barking, chewing, drinking, laying, shivering and sniffing."
The team tested how the technology stacked up for different dog breeds.
"This had to work for all dogs," Ladha said. "So the challenge was to map distinct [behaviors] that correlated whether the collar was being worn by a square-shouldered bulldog or a tiny [Chihuahua]."
"It also presents us with a real opportunity to use man's best friend as a discreet health barometer. It's already well known that pets are good for our health and this new technology means dogs are supporting their older owners to live independently in even more ways than they already do," PhD student Nils Hammerla, said. Undergraduate Emma Allen also worked on the study.
The Ladha said the idea for the project came naturaly.
"We do a lot of work with ageing population in our lab. The step was a natural one for us to apply this sort of technology to this audience and we are very familiar with the steps in doing so," Ladha said in an email to Headlines and Global News.
