Browsing by Author "Fan, Shih-Chen"

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Activity-oriented design of Health Pal: A smart phone for elders' healthcare support
(2008)
Zao, John K.
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Fan, Shih-Chen
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Wen, Ming-Hui
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Hsu, Chun-Tang
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Hung, Chung-Hoo
Wireless telephones and personal digital assistants are emerging, as the information hubs connect their human users with assorted electronic devices and the World Wide Web. As such, they quickly become the de facto basis for personalized information services. The Kannon project team at the National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) in Taiwan is developing a ubiquitous service infrastructure for elders' healthcare support. Among their deliverables, there is a PDA Phone, christened Health Pal, which can communicate with Bluetooth/ZigBee devices, universal plug-and-play (UPnP) e-home service platforms, and online healthcare providers to offer 24/7 healthcare services to elderly people. This paper presents the early results of this effort including the functional and operational concepts of Health Pal as well as the activity-oriented approach of its design. Preliminary results of its usefulness and usability evaluations are reported. A comparison of this platform against several similar prototypes was also included to illustrate the advantage of applying activity-oriented design approach to human-computer interactions. Copyright (C) 2008.
Custos Remote On-demand Healthcare Aided with Wireless Sensors and Mobile Phones
(2008)
Zao, John K.
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Fan, Shih-Chen
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Yang, Bing-Shiang
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Hsu, Shang-Hwa
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Cheng, Han-Chin
Telemonitoring and remote healthcare are two ICT techniques promise to deliver cost effective long-term healthcare services to the aging population worldwide. Anticipating an emerging market opportunity, NCTU Kannon project team is creating Custos, an open composeable platform for developing remote on-demand healthcare applications using smart phones and wireless sensor networks. Camps' is integrated readily with Internet web services and UPnP digital-home platform so that it can be used to detect abnormal health conditions through multisensor data fusion, adapt environment conditions to user needs, dispatch medical alerts and instigate remedial actions via SMS/RSS communication. Moreover, Custos is easy to program because it uses Sun SPOT and Squawk Java J2ME as its sensor/actuator hub. In this position paper, we present the design principles, system architecture and operation concepts of Custos as well as a pilot plan for clinical trials in the Geriatric Psychiatry Ward of Wei-Gong Memorial Hospital in Miaoli, Taiwan.
Improved Intrinsic Motivation and Muscle Activation Patterns in Reaching Task Using Virtual Reality Training for Stroke Rehabilitation: A Pilot Randomized Control Trial
(2014-01-01)
Fan, Shih-Chen
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Su, Fong-Chin
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Chen, Sheng-Shiung
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Hou, Wen-Hsuan
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Sun, Jui-Sheng
In long-term rehabilitation, stoke survivors might experience low motivation and poor adhesion to treatments. In such cases, off-the-shelf virtual reality (OTSVR) gaming systems can be a viable solution. The purpose of this exploratory study was to evaluate the effects of an affordable OTSVR treatment on patients\' motivation and motor capacities. The ultimate goal is to apply the advantages of the OTSVR system to the design of future systems. Twenty participants completed the follow-up assessment. Four parallel groups received treatments for three weeks: 1) virtual reality (VR) via Wii gaming; 2) conventional therapy; 3) a placebo board game; 4) no treatment. The training effects were evaluated immediately after and four weeks after treatment. Surface electromyographic activity for a reaching task was obtained from five muscles, and the time-to-peak (TTP) contractions, time that a muscle takes to reach maximum contractions, was used as a kinesiological parameter. Any functional gains were evaluated using the Jebsen-Taylor Hand Function Test and the Stroke Impact Scale. The VR group immediately demonstrated significantly shorter TTP contractions in their biceps and flexor carpi radialis compared to the those of the board game and no treatment groups (p < 0.05). The TTP contraction change between the VR group and the conventional therapy group did not have significant differences. The VR group having a marginally retentional improvement in the deltoids (p = 0.059). No long-term benefits persisted in any other muscle. However, the VR group showed higher intrinsic motivation than those of the other groups. In this pilot study, OTSVR gaming had immediate effects on motor recovery and provided motivation for treatment compliance in stroke patients.