Using RFID to prevent or detect falls, wandering, bed egress and medication errors

• US 7,714,728 B2
• Filed: 01/08/2007
• Issued: 05/11/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/07/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: GT Angel LLC
• Original Assignee: GT Angel LLC
• Inventors: Koblasz, Arthur
• Primary Examiner(s): Wu; Daniel
• Assistant Examiner(s): TUN, NAY L
• Application Number:
  US11/651,117
• Publication Number:
  US 20070159332A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,219 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 340/573.1
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2562/182 Electrical shielding, e.g. using a Faraday cage
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1115 Monitoring leaving of a patient support, e.g. a bed or a wheelchair
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1117 Fall detection
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/411 Detecting or monitoring allergy or intolerance reactions to an allergenic agent or substance
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6807 Footwear
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0261 System arrangements wherein the object is to detect trespassing over a fixed physical boundary, e.g. the end of a garden
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0275 Electronic Article Surveillance [EAS] tag technology used for parent or child unit, e.g. same transmission technology, magnetic tag, RF tag, RFID
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0288 Attachment of child unit to child/article
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/043 detecting an emergency event, e.g. a fall
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0461 integrated or attached to an item closely associated with the person but not worn by the person, e.g. chair, walking stick, bed sensor
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0476 Cameras to detect unsafe condition, e.g. video cameras
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/0492 Sensor dual technology, i.e. two or more technologies collaborate to extract unsafe condition, e.g. video tracking and RFID tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 21/22 responsive to presence or absence of persons
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/63 for local operation

Abstract

Systems, methods, and devices for using body-worn RFID tags related instrumentation located in the premises where a monitored person is located to prevent or detect specific types of movements of the person, such as falls from which the person has not recovered, wandering, bed egress, attempted room egress, and medication errors. The body-worn RFID tags may include an upper body RFID tag located in a wrist band and a lower body RFID tag located in a sock worn by the monitored person. The RFID instrumentation located in the premises may include one or more antennas located in the floor, door, bed frame, and mattress. The systems may also activate response actions upon detecting specified movements, such as sending an alert message to a patient monitoring system, activating an alarm, activating an camera, and/or playing a recorded message to the person.

Claims

1. A system for monitoring and responding to predefined movements of a monitored person within premises occupied by the person, comprising:

an upper-body RFID tag and a lower-body RFID tag, wherein the upper-body RFID tag is distinguishable from the lower-body RFID tag as a fall tag;

a plurality of RFID antennas located in the premises comprising at least one RFID floor antenna associated with flooring in the premise, at least one RFID bed antenna associated with a bed assigned to the person, and at least one RFID door antenna associated with a doorknob or doorway providing egress from the premises;

one or more controllers electrically connected to the plurality of RFID antennas and configured to receive signals received from the upper-body RFID tag and the lower-body RFID tag, the one or more controllers further configured to

determine a fall has occurred when the upper-body RFID tag remains close to the RFID floor antenna, and

determine unauthorized movement of the monitored person has occurred according to detection of the lower-body RFID tag in proximity to one or more of the plurality of RFID antennas; and

a response system configured to implement one or more response actions in response to detecting the fall or unauthorized movement.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the response actions comprise transmitting an attendant call message associated with an alert activated in response to the detected fall or unauthorized movement, and recording attendant response times based in the detection of the arrival of an RFID tag worn by an attendant at the premises in response to the call message.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the controller is configured to detect a fall from which the person has not recovered by detecting that the upper-body RFID tag worn by the monitored person has entered into close proximity to the RFID floor antenna for a predetermined period of time that may be customized according to the monitored person.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the RFID bed antenna comprises an RFID antenna located in or attached to a bed frame or mattress associated with the bed assigned to the person for sleeping within the premises;

the controller is configured to detect bed egress by detecting when the lower-body RFID tag worn by the person has moved past a read range of the RFID bed antenna; and

the response actions comprise transmission of a bed egress message to a patient monitoring system.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the upper-body RFID tag is configured as a wrist tag worn on a wrist of the monitored person;

the controller is configured to detect attempted room egress by detecting that the wrist tag worn by the monitored person has moved into close proximity to the door antenna associated with the doorknob of a door providing egress to the premises; and

the response actions comprise activation of a pre-recorded or voice synthesized voice message that warns the monitored person with respect to unauthorized egress, the pre-recorded or voice synthesized voice message being in a preferred language associated with the monitored person and at a volume level adjusted by the controller for any hearing impairments associated with the monitored person.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the plurality of RFID antennas further comprises an RFID antenna associated with medication;

the controller is further configured to detect an authorized medication access by detecting that the upper-body RFID tag worn by the person has moved into close proximity to the RFID antenna associated with the medication that the person is authorized to access; and

the response actions comprise transmitting an authorized medication access message to the patient monitoring system.

7. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

an RFID tag or barcode label associated with medication within the premises associated with the monitored person;

wherein the controller is further configured to detect each medication delivery to the monitored person by detecting that the RFID tag or barcode label associated with the medication has moved into close proximity with the RFID bed antenna or barcode reader in order to determine whether the medication has been delivered within a predetermined dosage time associated with the medication; and

the response actions comprise recording or transmitting a late medication delivery indication in response to a determination that the medication has not been delivered until after the predetermined dosage time.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the RFID bed antenna comprises an RFID antenna printed on or affixed to a mattress cover or mattress pad.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the RFID bed antenna comprises an RFID bed frame antenna located with or attached to a bed frame supporting a mattress, further comprising a conductive shield located under or within the mattress, a mattress cover or mattress pad, wherein the conductive shield is configured to prevent the RFID bed frame antenna from detecting the presence of a body-worn RFID tag located above the conductive shield until the body-worn RFID tag moves away from the conductive shield and into close proximity to the RFID bed frame antenna.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the RFID floor antenna comprises conductive leads affixed to flooring sections, floor tiles, carpet backing, underlayment pad or a polymer fabric associated with flooring within the premises.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the RFID floor antenna comprises concentric U-shaped conductive leads located under or within a flooring component such that each concentric U-shaped conductive lead comprises two open ends that each abut an edge of the flooring component, and an edge connector configured for connection to the edge of the flooring component that electrically connects the U-shaped conductive leads into a continuous spiral antenna.

12. The system of claim 1, further comprising an RFID antenna located in a portable bathroom mat configured for detecting a fall within a bathroom in which the bathroom mat is located.

13. The system of claim 1, further comprising an RFID antenna located within or under a shower stall or tub configured for detecting a fall within the shower stall or tub.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein the response action comprises transmission of a fall alert message which is repeated at periodic intervals until an RFID tag worn by an attendant is detected in close proximity to the monitored person.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the RFID bed antenna comprises an RFID antenna located in or attached to a bed frame or mattress associated with the bed assigned to the person for sleeping within the premises;

when “

electronic bed restraint”

has been ordered, the one or more response actions comprise a pre-recorded or synthesized voice message in a preferred language of the monitored person and at a volume level appropriate for any hearing impairments identified for the monitored person, wherein the voice message requests the monitored person to remain in the bed.

16. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the at least one RFID floor antenna comprises two RFID floor antennas positioned proximate to the doorway providing egress from the premises, and

the controller is configured to detect attempted room egress by detecting that the lower-body RFID tag worn by the monitored person has moved through close proximity with the two RFID floor antennas in a direction toward room egress;

the response actions comprise activation of a pre-recorded or voice synthesized voice message that warns the monitored person with respect to unauthorized egress, the pre-recorded or voice synthesized voice message being in a preferred language associated with the monitored person and at a volume level adjusted by the controller for any hearing impairments associated with the monitored person.

17. A system for monitoring and responding to a fall from which a monitored person has not recovered within premises occupied by the person, comprising:

a body-worn RFID fall tag;

one or more RFID floor antennas associated with flooring in the premise;

one or more controllers electrically connected to the one or more RFID floor antennas and configured to receive signals received from the body-worn RFID fall tag and to determine a fall has occurred when the body-worn RFID fall tag remains close to the one or more RFID floor antennas for a predetermined period of time according to a health condition of the monitored person; and

one or more response systems configured to activate one or more response actions in response to the determination that the monitored person has engaged in the fall from which the monitored person has not recovered.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the response actions comprise transmitting a fall alert message to a patient monitoring system and detecting an RFID tag worn by an attending party entering into close proximity to the monitored person subsequent to the detected fall indicating that the attending party has responded to the fall alert message.

19. The system of claim 17, wherein the floor RFID antennas comprise a first floor antenna located in a bathroom mat located in a bathroom within the premises configured to detect a fall in the bathroom, and a second floor antenna comprising antenna leads located under or within a shower or bathtub to detect falls while bathing.

20. An RFID floor antenna system configured for communication with a body-worn RFID tag for detecting a fall of a monitored person within premises occupied by the person, comprising:

a floor covering;

a plurality of concentric U-shaped conductive leads located within the floor covering, wherein each of the concentric U-shaped conductive leads comprises two open ends that abut an edge of the floor covering, and wherein cutting off a side of the floor covering parallel to the edge shortens a length of each of the plurality of concentric U-shaped conductive leads while maintaining a quantity of the concentric U-shaped conductive leads and allowing the open ends of the concentric U-shaped conductive leads to be electrically interconnected to create a multi-loop spiral antenna communicating with said body-worn RFID tag in detecting said fall of said monitored person.

21. The system of claim 20, further comprising:

a circuit board configured for connection to an edge connector and comprising circuitry configured to electrically interconnect the plurality of concentric U-shaped conductive leads into the multi-loop spiral antenna,

wherein the edge connector comprises a plurality of needle contacts configured to penetrate the floor covering to make electrical contact with the open ends of the concentric U-shaped conductive leads.