Design of low-cost, wearable remote health monitoring and alert system for elderly heart patients

Most senior citizens are often neglected and are helpless in times of medical emergencies, as they are alone in their twilight years. To tackle this, we have come up with a prospective Remote Health Monitoring and Alert System (RHMAS). In elderly people heart attacks are associated with symptoms like, body temperature fluctuations, high BP, profuse sweating, improper cardiac rhythm etc. Our solution is to integrate robust sensors capable of sensing and monitoring these symptoms with a microcontroller to alert the next of kin and health services during emergencies. Since most devices for this purpose are wired, a wireless device wouldn't interfere with the movement of the user The proposed system consists of a Photo-Plethysmography (PPG) based pulse sensor, to detect arrhythmia, a temperature sensor to constantly monitor their body temperature and a sweat sensor to monitor the Galvanic Skin Response (GSR). A GSM module will send an alert to the next of kin if the monitored data deviates from the nominal body condition. If the monitored data reaches emergency levels, health services would also be alerted.