Data Augmentation to Address Various Rotation Errors of Wearable Sensors for Robust Pre-impact Fall Detection

Objective:
This paper proposes a novel application of data augmentation to address various rotation errors of wearable sensors for robust pre-impact fall detection. In such systems, sensor rotation errors are inevitable because of loose attachment and body movement during long deployment.
Methods:
Two augmented models with uniform and normal strategies were compared with a non-augmented model on the original dataset (no rotation error) and a validation dataset (with rotation error). The validation dataset was constructed with three types of rotation errors, namely, pitch, roll, and compound roll and pitch (CRP) at three levels of range (low: 15°, medium: 30°, and high: 45°).
Results:
Five-fold cross validation showed the two augmented models maintained accuracy (>98.5%) as high as the non-augmented model on the original dataset but showed considerable improvements of 6.11% and 6.50% on the validation dataset, respectively. CRP error negatively affected the model accuracy the most, followed by pitch and then roll errors. In addition, the normal model had advantages over the uniform model in the low-to-medium range of error, which is expected to be the typical error range in practical applications. As for lead time, similarly, the augmented models achieved performance similar to the non-augmented model on the original dataset but showed significant improvements on the validation dataset.
Conclusion and significance:
Data augmentation had notable capacities to address sensor rotation errors for practical applications and augmented models especially the normal model showed good potential to be embedded in a wearable system for robust pre-impact fall detection and injury prevention.