Description

System and method of remote monitoring and relief via GSM

Technical Field

The present invention relates to a remote relief system receiving remote calls for intervention regarding emergency situations and, more particularly, concerns a device for transmitting danger signals and/or a first aid request based on the information relating to the monitoring of the physical state of a person by ordinary telecommunication means of the public cellular telephony.

Legend AT Code number of all control signals to be sent to modems compatible with Hayes standard;

Data Logger Automatic system for the registration of environment parameters;

GSM Global System for Mobile communications I/O Input/Output

Modem MODulator DEModulator SIM Subscriber Identification Module

SMS Short Message Service

Background Art

The increase in the middle age of the population in most industrialized countries makes the needs of elders even more pressing and fosters the request for new apparatus designed for such categories of people and patients as well. Remote relief apparatus known today include a telephone exchange, i.e. an apparatus connected to the fixed telephone line and able to transmit (once it is

operated by a push-button) remote relief requests. Such requests can be vocal messages or digital messages previously registered and able to locate the remote calling exchange. Many known devices also allow a dialogue between the receiver of the relief request and the person calling for help provided that the latter is within the reach of the microphone and loudspeaker installed in the remote exchange connected to the fixed telephone line.

Some known apparatus provided with siren allow any local rescue squads to intervene. In addition to the push-button on the telephone exchange, a small-size remote control device to be used as a collar is sometimes provided. Some manufacturers propose a central relief request service (consisting of telephone interfaces, computers, terminals, and software) to be used by the remote relief service providers to help the reception of the requests. The known apparatus are suffering from a number of drawbacks.

The remote control device is able to send the relief request only within a domestic area, the elder being thus allowed to move from a room to another room. The drawback of such solution is that the elder often forgets the remote control device in some home area. Therefore, he/she cannot dispose of it in case of emergency. Some manufacturers propose to users to wear the remote control device round the neck by a string delivered therewith.

However, users unwilling to accept their psychological elder condition do not agree something like that could be referred to as a collar. This explains why many sons who gave the parents a remote control device cannot do other than ascertaining its falling into disuse.

The cited solutions operate, as already mentioned, by a fixed telephone line, however, the current telecommunication means certainly meets the growing request of safety even in mobility situations. In particular, cellular telephony allows a

central exchange to be continuously into contact with the person having a mobile phone. The use of a cellular or mobile phone allows to overcome daily danger situations as well as to fulfil help needs (calls to useful numbers such as 112, 113, 118, etc., sudden failures of a car, fire, fears of violence or impending robbery). Drawing up a thorough list of the countless situations in which the mobile phone can perform a safeguard function is certainly a hard task. In any case, such mobile phone still remains an apparatus for standard communications and then is mainly used to allow anyone to communicate at the distance with anyone else by voice, fax or SMS. However, other functionalities and performances are requested to a cellular phone to perform a reliable remote relief function.

For example, it is known that the remote relief request is managed by telephone connection to a central security exchange. Thus, precious time could be wasted to forward a help request to the first aid or a police station. Still, even if a first-aid physician is called, a long time could be necessary for an ambulance to reach the endangered person.

It is self-evident that a safety device for the remote relief should operate as quickly as possible to limit the danger conditions and relative injuries. On the other hand, the help request is often transmitted to a group of telephone numbers, i.e. relatives, acquaintances, etc. according to a well-defined priority. The repetition of such group of telephone numbers could fail to find help in real time because the called person is absent or occupied, thus wasting further precious time. Moreover, if the use of a GSM cellular phone allows, on one side, a remote relief request to be transmitted quickly and at a low cost, on the other side, an unsolved basic problem is that the called person has no information about the location of the person asking for help.

The invention disclosed herein provides a solution to the problems mentioned above.

Actually, the object of the present invention is to provide a remote relief device

operating in real time over cellular telephone line that can be used both in domestic area and open space, for example also from city to city, and can be worn by the user so that it cannot be seen by other people. A further object of the present invention is to provide a remote relief device operating over cellular telephone line and having a low cost so that it can be used by the elders of a society directed to the social security of an even larger component of the population.

It is still an object of the present invention to provide a remote relief device using transmission protocols and standard technologies of the public cellular telephony to make the system still less expensive, of easy maintenance and use both at home and the outside.

These and other objects which will be evident from the following description are accomplished by a remote relief device the features of which are disclosed in the appended claims.

Description of a Preferred Embodiment

A preferred embodiment of the invention is disclosed herebelow only by way of a not limiting example and without limiting the generality and the possible application fields with reference to the accompanying drawings. Reference is made to a device 1 comprising a GSM unit 2 interfaced with an acceleration detector 8 operating by gravity or more generally by displacement. A more sophisticated embodiment is provided with two different accelerometers: the first one with fine regulation operates over extremely reduced displacement ranges; the second one is arranged to detect larger displacements. It should be appreciated that device 1 is worn by the user by means of a belt which has to be fastened to switch on the remote control system, i.e. if the ends of the belt are fastened to each other, the control system is activated automatically as it is supposed that the device is worn by the user. Conversely, if the belt is not fastened,

it is believed that the device is not worn by the user and then the remote control system is not activated. Practically the system is switched off. The arrangement in a vertical position of the device according to the present invention in the belt of the user is far advantageous. Such arrangement allows the fall of the user or the overturning of a wheel chair to be detected immediately. The sensor arranged for this purpose will detect immediately the different disposition of the user just sensing that control device 1 is not vertical any more. GSM unit 2 is provided with live voice connection 5 and alarm warning horn. In addition, it is provided with a SIM card 11 in which the numbers to be called by the user are stored. More specifically, SIM card 11 can be programmed by the seller upon purchasing the device by the user as well as thereafter by means of any GSM cellular phone by sending a SMS in a predefined format to the phone number corresponding to such SIM. GSM unit 2, that can be of the type Telit Gm862, is mainly a modem interfaced with the outside by AT controls on the serial line 9 derived from dedicated pins.

Figure 1 still shows the connections from such GSM unit to microphone and loudspeaker of the live voice device 5.

The activation of the remote relief call is carried out according to procedures well- known to those skilled in the art and providing predetermined steps to set up a communication, i.e.: call request, dialling of the telephone number, reply of the called receiver, communication frequency transaction, and at last real communication by line connection.

For this reason GSM unit 2 does not cooperate directly with sensor block 8 but through a smart unit such as a microcontroller 7 (type Inbond W925E with microprocessor of 8051 -family) with the task of controlling the communication both with GSM unit 2 on one side and sensor 8 on the other side. Such microcontroller 7 includes typical units such as microprocessor 7', memories 7" of different types, and I/O units 7'". The latter are interfaced with the outside to

get or send information and signals. In the disclosed embodiment, at least one I/O gate is programmed to get the movement signal from sensor 8. To sum up, the call of the remote relief telephone number will be made only in case microcontroller 7 detects that the input received from the sensor corresponds to an emergency situation.

Operation and activation of the call

The device according to the present invention detects if the user is living or is fallen down on the basis of his/her displacements and movements. In fact, the movement sensor detects the slightest abdominal and/or thoracic moving. In particular the moving relative to respiration is detected. Thus, two possible emergency conditions are detected: a- the user has made an abrupt move and is fallen down so that the attitude sensor detects a horizontal position, however, he/she is not motionless as the slight move of the body surface regarding respiration is detected. b- a total stillness of the user is detected so that the unfortunate indication that he/she is dead can be inferred as no slight move connected to respiration is detected.

The greater effectiveness of the system concerned is evident as it does not perform aleatory, uncertain, expensive detections. Sensing skin conductance or temperature which is instead measured by other remote relief apparatus to detect whether the user is still alive allows only non-objective, risky indications to be obtained, while it is evident that the user is dead if he/she does not move any longer. The solution is then less expensive with respect to the state of art as it makes use of less sensorics but at the same time it is functionally more effective as the most suitable sensors are used.

Additionally, while most remote relief systems are interfaced with fixed telephone exchange, the solution according to the present invention operates under mobility.

Actually, the system communicates directly with the remote central exchange by

GSM line. The advantage over the above-mentioned known systems operating by fixed telephony is that the user can be monitored everywhere he/she is if there is covering for the cellular network. Moreover, the user can activate live voice connection and then talk to the called person and receive a reply in real time.

In a further embodiment there is provided an integration of the GSM service with the complementary functionality of the GPS technology that allows the position of children or elders wearing the remote relief device to be located in case they get lost and are not able to communicate their position.

The remote relief device according to the present invention can be operated at any time in case of one of the following three conditions: a- depressing push-button 12 for the manual activation; b- no move for a predetermined time interval; c- detecting a sudden, violent move and the loss of the vertical position by a sensor/microcontroller system.

Immediately after one of the above-mentioned activations, live voice connection 5 provided in GSM unit 2 is operated.

Under such alarm conditions the system begins a predetermined series of calls of programmed, stored telephone numbers dialled after one another until at least two valid replies are obtained. In such case, the connection to remote relief customer care centres is provided.

After every reply, the system sends firstly a pre-registered vocal message and then operates the live voice connection. At the end of the first valid call the sequence of operations stars again until the second valid call is completed.

The alarm stop can also be operated manually at a distance by depressing a series of push-buttons of the receiving apparatus.

According to an embodiment in which there is a remote relief customer care centre

for each user of the service, an univocal identification number with which the GSM telephone number and data of the user along with further service parameters are associated is stored in said centre. It is important to notice that the identification number of the SIM card of GSM unit 2 associated with the calling number is an univocal code with which the data of the user can be associated so that the identification of the calling user through his/her cellular phone number upon request of remote relief allows his/her exact, immediate recognition at the central exchange receiving the remote relief call or by the person receiving the call. Therefore, in the embodiment providing the assistance by a customer care centre, a series of information such as the type of patient, the diagnosis, the current pathologies is available at the service centre so that a physician can be informed at a distance to give first aid to the patient. In a different application of the present invention, the device is designed for the remote control of animals. The hardware of the apparatus is essentially the same with some adjustments and initial settings.

As described above, at least an I/O gate 7'" is programmed to get the motion signal from sensor 8. Therefore, the telephone number of the remote relief system is called after all only if microcontroller 7 detects that the input received from sensor 8 corresponds to an emergency condition.

It is evident that if device 1 should be set to follow the state of an animal, the sensor detecting the vertical position has to be deactivated and the sensitivity of the detector of sudden moves has to be adjusted to a minimum. In fact, an animal, e.g. a dog or a cat, usually makes sudden moves certainly not effected by an elder or a patient.

Also the position sensor has to be deactivated because it provides the indication of the horizontal position of a person in case, for instance, of a fall, while in case of an animal its prone position on the ground with any possible turning on the back is

quite insignificant to evaluate the physical conditions of the animal.

Figure 2 shows a block diagram representing different functional modalities by which the same device 1 operates with regard to different modes of use.

It is evident that two different inizialization steps 11 ' and 11" are necessary as the same device is operated.

On one hand, in case of an animal, there is provided: a- the positioning 12' to OFF of the vertical-position sensor; b- the adjustment 13' of the sensitivity of the movement sensor to a minimum; c- the activation 14' of the no-move detection. On the other hand, for a person there is provided initially: i- the positioning 12" to ON of the vertical-position sensor, ii- the adjustment 13" of the sensitivity of the movement sensor to a maximum; iii- the activation 14" of the no-move detection. After the initial setting the cyclic interrogation of the subject's state is carried out operatively according to two different modes.

Alarm condition 15' for an animal provides a test 16' based exclusively on the total stillness of the same. In case of a person, data acquisition 18' is registered cyclically not only until a condition of total stillness of the person is reached but also in case of displacement of the vertical-position sensor or in case of detection of a sudden, violent movement. Such three conditions are evaluated in condition block 16".

The solution for embodying a versatile device as disclosed above which can be used both for people and animals is extremely advantageous as far as production cost is concerned. In fact, the reduction in cost is well known in the electronic field as the quantity of the production increases.

Advantages and industrialization of the invention

Other known solutions propose to detect a plurality of biometric quantities such as

body temperature, skin conductance, heart rate, blood pressure, etc. by a bracelet, however, the apparatus gets heavier and above all is not reliable as it performs a non-objective detection if it is too large, while it causes reddening or abrasion if it is too tight. The device according to the present invention reduces the detected information and the transmitted data (very redundant in the solutions mentioned above) to a minimum with the result of reducing the cost of production and management to reach an essential consideration, i.e. whether the monitored person has fallen down and whether he/she is alive or dead. A further advantage coming from such simple embodiment is that the intervention of a technician at the domicile of the user is not necessary upon the first activation, a call to customer care being sufficient in case of need.

The solution providing the insertion of the remote relief device in the belt of the user is extremely advantageous because the user will wear such device also in the unfortunate case of a relief need without having to look around for any remote control and without wearing any collar. As already mentioned, the collar to wear round the neck certainly inhibits the user who feels "marked" as unable to take care of him/herself. The preferred embodiment disclosed above according to an essential configuration comprising only indispensable components to reduce the cost and only movement sensors of different types should not be considered limitative or restrained. It is evident that other biometric quantities can be detected and transmitted in real time by providing the remote control device disclosed so far with the suitable sensorics. To this end, it should be appreciated that just the used GSM unit and the already mentioned Telit GM862 are typically used by interfacing them with data loggers for remote measurements in a number of technical fields and detecting numberless types of physical parameters at the same time. Therefore, in case of a detection in real time of the blood pressure, temperature,

and other biometric quantities relative to the user and if the detected data is sent via GSM line to the customer care centre, the remote relief device can immediately and continuously carry out a monitoring of the patient by a physician who will follow the development of the physical conditions of the patient through the variation of the acquired data.

A series of alarm means and safety devices allow the system to control the failures of the GSM unit. In case of almost exhausted battery, an acoustic alarm signal is issued to the outside. A similar alarm signal is transmitted in case the GSM signal is outside the covering area.