SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR NON-INTRUSIVE HEALTH MONITORING IN THE HOME

• US 20120136217A1
• Filed: 11/30/2010
• Published: 05/31/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 11/30/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Universal Electronics, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Universal Electronics, Inc.
• Inventors: Cheung Hyen, David Chong, Hayes, Patrick H.
• Granted Patent: US 8,905,927 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/300
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2505/07 Home care
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0002 Remote monitoring of patients using telemetry, e.g. transmission of vital signals via a communication network A61B5/07 takes precedence; transmission systems for measured values G08C; transmission H04B; transmission of digital information H04L; wireless communication networks H04W
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0004 characterised by the type of physiological signal transmitted
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/02055 Simultaneously evaluating both cardiovascular condition and temperature
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/11 Measuring movement of the entire body or parts thereof, e.g. head or hand tremor, mobility of a limb for measuring pulse A61B5/02 ;A61B5/1038 takes precedence; motion detection to correct for motion artifacts in physiological signals A61B5/721
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6826 Finger
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6898 Portable consumer electronic devices, e.g. music players, telephones, tablet computers
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/72 Signal processing specially adapted for physiological signals or for diagnostic purposes character recognition, recognising digital ink, document-oriented image-based pattern recognition G06V30/00; recognition or understanding of postal images G06V30/424
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/746 Alarms related to a physiological condition, e.g. details of setting alarm thresholds or avoiding false alarms alarms per se G08B
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/747 in case of emergency, i.e. alerting emergency services
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7475 User input or interface means, e.g. keyboard, pointing device, joystick
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42201 biosensors, e.g. heat sensor for presence detection, EEG sensors or any limb activity sensors worn by the user input arrangements for interaction with the human body based on nervous system activity detection G06F3/015
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42204 User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor constructive details of casings for the remote control device H01H9/0235; user interfaces for controlling a tuning device of a television receiver through a remote control H03J9/00; remote control of peripheral devices connected to a television receiver through the remote control device of the television receiver H04B1/205
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44218 Detecting physical presence or behaviour of the user, e.g. using sensors to detect if the user is leaving the room or changes his face expression during a TV program methods or arrangements for recognising human body or animal bodies or body parts G06V40/10; methods or arrangements for acquiring or recognising human faces, facial parts, facial sketches, facial expressions G06V40/16; methods or arrangements for recognising movements or behaviour G06V40/20; arrangements for identifying users in broadcast systems H04H60/45
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6168 involving cable transmission, e.g. using a cable modem
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/814 comprising emergency warnings arrangements specially adapted for emergency or urgency in broadcast systems H04H20/59; arrangements for providing alarms, notifications, alerts to substation in data switching networks H04L12/1895

Abstract

A hand-held device, such as a remote control, is provided for operation of a consumer appliance and is equipped with one or more biometric sensors to capture and report on the health condition of a user of the hand-held device. The data captured by such a hand-held device may be evaluated locally in the hand-held device itself or may be conveyed to a target consumer appliance either for local evaluation by that consumer appliance or for onward transmission to a central off-site monitoring service.

Claims

1. A system for providing a health monitoring service, comprising:

a controllable consumer appliance;

a hand-held device having a transmitter, a user interface activatable to cause the transmitter to transmit commands to control functional operations of the controllable consumer appliance, and at least one biometric sensor for capturing biometric data from a user and for transmitting via the transmitter to the controllable consumer appliance data indicative of the captured biometric data; and

a centralized, health monitoring service center in communication with the controllable consumer appliance for receiving from the consumer appliance data indicative of the captured biometric data;

wherein one or more of the controllable consumer appliance, the hand-held device, and the centralized, health monitoring service center function to selectively enable the capturing of biometric data by the at least one biometric sensor and to evaluate the captured biometric data to determine a health condition of the user.

2. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the controllable consumer appliance comprises a settop box.

3. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein the settop box is in communication with the centralized, health monitoring system via a cable network.

4. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein the settop box is in communication with the centralized, health monitoring system via a satellite network.

5. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein the settop box is in further communication with a television device.

6. The system as recited in claim 5, wherein the settop box issues a transmission to cause the television device to present a warning that captured biometric data exceeds one or more threshold values.

7. The system as recited in claim 6, wherein the centralized, health monitoring system instructs the settop box to issue the transmission to cause the television device to present the warning.

8. The system as recited in claim 6, wherein the hand-held device instructs the settop box to issue the transmission to cause the television device to present the warning.

9. The system as recited in claim 2, wherein functional operations of the television device are also controllable via use of the hand-held device.

10. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the hand-held device has a receiver and the controllable consumer appliance issues a transmission to the hand-held device via the receiver to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

11. The system as recited in claim 10, wherein the centralized, health monitoring service center instructs the controllable consumer appliance to issue the transmission to the hand-held device to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

12. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the hand-held device has a timing device and a time measured by the timing device is used to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

13. The system as recited in claim 12, wherein the hand-held device has a receiver and the controllable consumer appliance issues a transmission to the hand-held device via the receiver to establish the time measured by the timing device.

14. The system as recited in claim 13, wherein the centralized, health monitoring service center instructs the controllable consumer appliance to issue the transmission to the hand-held device to establish the time measured by the timing device.

15. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the at least one biometric sensor is selectively enabled to repeat a capturing of biometric data in response to previously captured biometric data exceeding one or more threshold values.

16. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the at least one biometric sensor is selectively enabled to repeat a capturing of biometric data in response to previously captured biometric data being determined to be invalid.

17. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the hand-held device comprises a universal remote control.

18. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein the user interface further comprises a panic button activatable to cause an emergency alert to be transmitted to the controllable consumer appliance for receipt by the centralized, health monitoring service center.

19. The system as recited in claim 1, wherein data captured by the at least one biometric sensor is used to distinguish between plural different users of the system.

20. A method for providing a health monitoring service, comprising:

capturing biometric data via at least one biometric sensor of a hand-held device having a transmitter wherein the transmitter is used to transmit commands to control functional operations of a controllable consumer appliance in communication with a centralized, health monitoring service center and to transmit to the controllable consumer appliance data indicative of the captured biometric data;

selectively enabling the capturing of biometric data by the at least one biometric sensor; and

evaluating by at least one of the hand-held device, the controllable consumer appliance, and the centralized, health monitoring service center the captured biometric data to determine a health condition of the user.

21. The method as recited in claim 20, comprising causing the controllable consumer appliance to issue a transmission to cause a television device to present a warning that captured biometric data exceeds one or more threshold values.

22. The method as recited in claim 21, comprising causing the centralized, health monitoring system to instruct the controllable consumer appliance to issue the transmission to cause the television device to present the warning.

23. The method as recited in claim 21, comprising causing the hand-held device to instruct the settop box to issue the transmission to cause the television device to present the warning.

24. The method as recited in claim 20, wherein the hand-held device has a receiver and comprising causing the controllable consumer appliance to issue a transmission to the hand-held device via the receiver to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

25. The method as recited in claim 24, comprising causing the centralized, health monitoring service center to instruct the controllable consumer appliance to issue the transmission to the hand-held device to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

26. The method as recited in claim 20, wherein the hand-held device has a timing device and comprising using a time measured by the timing device to selectively enable the at least one biometric sensor.

27. The method as recited in claim 26, wherein the hand-held device has a receiver and comprising causing the controllable consumer appliance to issue a transmission to the hand-held device via the receiver to establish the time measured by the timing device.

28. The method as recited in claim 27, comprising causing the centralized, health monitoring service center to instruct the controllable consumer appliance to issue the transmission to the hand-held device to establish the time measured by the timing device.

29. The method as recited in claim 20, comprising selectively enabling the at least one biometric sensor to repeat a capturing of biometric data in response to previously captured biometric data exceeding one or more threshold values.

30. The method as recited in claim 20, comprising selectively enabling the at least one biometric sensor to repeat a capturing of biometric data in response to previously captured biometric data being determined to be invalid.

31. The method as recited in claim 20, comprising using data captured by the at least one biometric sensor to distinguish between plural different users.