Low power location-tracking device with combined short-range and wide-area wireless and location capabilities
First Claim
1. A personal monitoring and communication system comprises:
- at least one monitoring and communication control device;
at least one personal monitoring communication device that is coupled with a person being monitored and is in communication with the at least on monitoring and communication control device, wherein the personal monitoring control device comprises;
a panic button which the person being monitored can activate in an emergency,a short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver in communication with the at least one monitoring and communication control device, andan emergency beacon generator that is connected to the panic button which when pressed by a person being monitored activates the emergency beacon generator that generates an emergency beacon frequency hopping signal at a slow frequency hopping rate and including an arbitrarily long pseudorandom bit sequence for transfer to the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver for transmission.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A personal monitoring and communication system includes a monitoring and communication control device, at least one personal monitoring communication device coupled with a person and a personal monitoring communication device finder. The personal monitoring communication device includes a GPS receiver, cellular telephone circuits, and short-range wireless radio circuits for communicating with caregivers. The personal monitoring communication device finder receives an emergency beacon generated by one personal monitoring communication device and determines a location of the personal monitoring communication device. A dead reckoning circuit determines the position of the person from a reference location. A motion detection circuit determines that the person is moving, not moving, or has fallen. A battery power management circuit minimizes power consumption to increase battery life of a battery powering the personal monitoring communication device. A tamper detection circuit determines whether the personal monitoring communication device is coupled to the person.
69 Citations
92 Claims
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1. A personal monitoring and communication system comprises:
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at least one monitoring and communication control device; at least one personal monitoring communication device that is coupled with a person being monitored and is in communication with the at least on monitoring and communication control device, wherein the personal monitoring control device comprises; a panic button which the person being monitored can activate in an emergency, a short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver in communication with the at least one monitoring and communication control device, and an emergency beacon generator that is connected to the panic button which when pressed by a person being monitored activates the emergency beacon generator that generates an emergency beacon frequency hopping signal at a slow frequency hopping rate and including an arbitrarily long pseudorandom bit sequence for transfer to the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver for transmission. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 30, 31, 42, 43)
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- 18. The personal monitoring and communication system of claim 18 wherein the personal monitoring communication device circuits comprise a global positioning system receiver, a cellular telephone radio transmitter/receiver, and the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver and the motion detection circuit.
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19. The personal monitoring and communication system of claim 19 wherein when the function status monitor determines that the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver is in communication with a short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver of the monitoring and communication control device, the state machine instructs the global positioning system receiver and the cellular telephone radio transmitter/receiver to be deactivated.
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32. A personal monitoring communication device that is coupled with a person being monitored and is in communication with at least one monitoring and communication control device for monitoring and communicating with the person, wherein the personal monitoring communication device comprises:
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a panic button which the person being monitored can activate in an emergency; a short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver in communication with the at least one monitoring and communication control device; and an emergency beacon generator that is connected to the panic button which when pressed by a person being monitored activates the emergency beacon generator that generates an emergency beacon frequency hopping signal at a slow frequency hopping rate and including an arbitrarily long pseudorandom bit sequence for transfer to the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver for transmission. - View Dependent Claims (33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 44, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62)
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45. The personal monitoring and communication device of claim 45 wherein the motion detection circuit comprises:
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a gyroscope for generating a direction signal indicating a direction that the person is moving; an three-axis accelerometer for generating signals indicating an acceleration vector indicating that the person is motion; a motion computation circuit coupled to the gyroscope and the three-axis accelerometer to receive the direction signal and the acceleration vector signals and determines if the person is in motion, or if the person has been inactive for an extended period of time, or if the person has fallen. - View Dependent Claims (46, 47)
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63. A personal monitoring communication device finder in communication with a personal monitoring communication device comprising:
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a receiver for acquiring the emergency beacon frequency hopping signal transmitted by the personal monitoring communication device; a slow frequency hopping sequence generator that provides a frequency sequence for the receiver that matches the slow frequency hopping rate to receive the emergency beacon frequency hopping signal; a frequency shift keying demodulator extracting a long pseudorandom bit sequence from the acquired emergency beacon frequency hopping signal; and a correlator in communication with the frequency shift keying demodulator to receive the extracted long pseudorandom bit sequence and a local version of the long pseudorandom bit sequence for determining a sampling absolute correlation value for the extracted long pseudorandom bit sequence and the local long pseudorandom bit sequence to determine an estimate of the distance of the personal monitoring communication device finder to the personal monitoring communication device transmitting the emergency beacon. - View Dependent Claims (64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71)
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72. A dead reckoning circuit incorporated within a personal monitoring and communication device for determining the position of the person coupled to the personal monitoring communication device, the dead reckoning circuit comprising:
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a gyroscope for determining a direction that the person coupled to the personal monitoring communication device is moving; a three-axis accelerometer for determining an acceleration vector when the person moves; and integration unit in communication with the three axis accelerometer to receive the acceleration vector that double integrates the acceleration vector to determine a displacement from a reference location. - View Dependent Claims (73, 74)
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75. A motion detection circuit within a personal monitoring communication device for determining that the person to which the personal monitoring communication device is coupled is in motion has no been in motion for an extended period of time, or has fallen, comprising:
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a gyroscope for generating a direction signal indicating a direction that the person is moving; an three-axis accelerometer for generating signals indicating an acceleration vector indicating that the person is motion; a motion computation circuit couple to the gyroscope and the three-axis accelerometer to receive the direction signal and the acceleration vector signals and determines if the person is in motion, or if the person has been inactive for an extended period of time, or if the person has fallen. - View Dependent Claims (76, 77)
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78. A battery power management circuit incorporated in on personal monitoring and communication device connected to a battery for minimizing power consumption to increase battery life of the battery powering the personal monitoring to communication device, wherein the battery power management circuit comprises:
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a battery power sensing device for determining an amount of power remaining in the battery; a function status monitor connected to a plurality of personal monitoring communication device circuits; and a state machine in communication with the battery power sensing device and the function status monitor to determine which of the personal monitoring communication device circuits may be deactivated or functionally degraded to conserve energy within the battery. - View Dependent Claims (79, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91)
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80. The battery power management circuit of claim 80 wherein when the function status monitor determines that the short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver is in communication with a short range wireless radio transmitter/receiver of the monitoring and communication control device, the state machine instructs the global positioning device receiver and the cellular telephone radio transmitter/receiver to be deactivated.
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92. A tamper detection circuit incorporated in a personal monitoring and communication device for detecting that person connected to the personal monitoring and communication device finder comprising:
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a capacitive sensor that senses the presence of the person being monitored; and a device-not-on-body reading circuit connected to the capacitive sensor to determine if the personal monitoring communication device is present such that when the personal monitoring communication device is not coupled to the person for a predetermined period of time an alert is triggered.
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Specification