Monitoring Activities of Daily Living of the Elderly and the Potential for Its Use in Telecare and Telehealth: A Review

Objective:This review was designed to determine whether telemonitoring activities of daily living (ADL) of elderly people can improve quality of life and be beneficial to their healthcare.Materials and Methods:Electronic databases were searched for studies that monitored ADL of elderly people and preferably measured some clinical outcomes such as ability to predict key events that require intervention and for studies that assessed perception of elderly people of such telemonitoring systems. The articles were reviewed and assessed independently by two reviewers.Results:One hundred seventy-five unique studies were found. Sixty-seven of these were identified for potential inclusion, and 25 studies were finally included. Study characteristics, parameters monitored, outcomes, and problems encountered were summarized and discussed. The main focus was on the potential benefits of ADL monitoring on the care of elderly people.Conclusions:Although most studies reported on technical improvements in methods for detecting changes in ADL, few, if any, determined the benefits to the patient of telemonitoring for changes in ADL or correlation with any physiological changes. We propose sensor and system characteristics for improved user acceptance and deployment in a large-scale care plan. We present areas requiring further investigation.