Home :: Completed Research Projects

Past research projects

HELP

7FP, 2009-2011, ICT. AAL.

HELP developed a system to dynamically monitorize and treat PD, composed of (a) an intra-oral electronic drug delivery device that is miniature, non-invasive and removable, (b) an external pump to deliver higher amounts of drug, (c) a PAN (Personal Area Network) to gather user's environment information to detect blockades, (d) a telecommunication and services infrastructure to analyze and transfer it both from the user to the automated system (most of the times) or caretaker (for the regular follow-up and emergencies) and in the opposite direction and (e) a remote point of care unit to supervise the patients. Such a system was able to administer anti-cholinergic agents in a controlled and on-demand basis, to control disease progression and to mitigate PD symptoms improving the quality of life of elderly people suffering this disease and their carers as well as reducing co-morbidity.

INREDIS

CENIT, MTAS, 2007-2011

The Relation Interfaces between the environment and the disabled people project was approved in July 2007. INREDIS is a CENIT (National Partnerships Strategic of Technical Investigation) project that registers in the initiative of the Spanish government TALENT 2010 and that is managed by the CDTI (Center of Industrial and Technological Development). INREDIS will develop basic investigation in the scope of the accessible and interoperable technologies during 2007-2010 period. Its objective is the development of base technologies that allow creating communication channels and interaction between persons with some type of special needs and their environments. of accessible and interoperable technology.

Momopa

FIS. ISCIII. 2009-2010

As Parkinson's disease progresses the medication effect is getting shorter and appear motor complications as blockades or dyskinesias. It has been suggested that the best treatment is one that maintains drug plasma levels steady, but rather adjust to the varying intensity of the different user's activities. Most recent therapeutic solutions treat Parkinson's disease by continuous administration of medication, as for example patches and pumps, but so far, no device has been able to adapt the plasma levels to the varying intensity of the patient. In this study we use a small inertial sensor placed in the waistband of patients with Parkinson's disease to study their movement in a continuated and ambulatory way. This study is aimed to provide this device with the appropiate processing capaticiy to identify different patient motion stages, taking special interets those situations that require a dose adjustment. Obtaining the above described process will be a substantial advance in the field: an immediate feedback may be used by a specialist to adjust dosage; in the future this technology may be adapted to pumps in order to regulate the medication.

AGEDA

Plan Avanza, MTAS, 2008-2010

Creation of a novel and flexible technological platform that provides an effective service to the attention and integrated management of services aimed to attend people with dependencies. This project is focused on: (1) provide a technological solution oriented to the business market based in housing assistance, daily centers and residences according with the new dependency law, and validated by the public administrations, (2) contribute to the reduction of digital obstacles by improving the accessibility for dependent people to technological services, as well as for those who take care of them and (3) promote a new professional area to lend dependency services, with more normalized processes but with sufficient flexible elements so that they can be adapted to any kind of specific needs.

ADA

MEC, 2007-2009, DPI2006-15630-C02-01

The aim of the ADA project is the development of novel control structures to be used in body sensor networks for gait and posture monitoring (wearable physical elements); on the evaluation of techniques for the autonomous movement of robotic vehicles for mobility aid; and on the design of evaluation metrics for any mobility system from the biomedical point of view: physical, measuring and analyzing corporal parameters of the individuals like cerebral, cardiac and respiratory activities, and psychological, evaluating and analyzing emotions, feelings and the user experience.

CAALYX

Sixth Framework Programme, 6FP, 2007-2008, IST-STREP-045215

CAALYX's main objective is to develop a wearable Light device able to measure specific vital signs of the elderly, to detect falls, and to communicate automatically in real time with his/her caregiver in case of an emergency, wherever the elderly person happens to be, at home or outside. The emergency information includes the geographic position alongside the health information of the elderly in a sensible way to enable the caretaker or emergency service to initiate and direct a timely and appropriate response.

OUD

OUD, Fundacion ONCE, Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya, 2008

The study is focused on exploring why the 12,70% of the Spaniard population has finalized college degrees, and why just 3.60% of people with disabilities has reached this educational level (INE, 2002). The aim of this work is to investigate which circumstances make young people with disabilities perceive college studies as something desirable and profitable for their life, such as identifying the main factors that have made their integration to academic life easier. The last purpose is to acquire enough knowledge to contribute and select the most efficient interventions to guide and facilitate the access to people with disabilities into the college environment, so that attending to school can become a feasible reality for them. This whole project is a qualitative study based in the analysis of the main characters, collected in exhaustive interviews

SIRAU

MTAS, IMSERSO 103/06, 2006-2007

The aim of SIRAU is to develop a service of RFID intelligent labelling formed by independent devices that communicate with a user-friendly interface system (PDA, mobile phone). Such a system will allow disabled and cognitive impaired people to indentify and interact with any type of daily life objects. The service will have an automatic acces to a remote system and will be completely adaptable to the capacity, preferences and expectations of the user. The system displays the most signicant information by the most conveinient interface (voice, image, braille).

SAPIENS

MTAS, IMSERSO, 103/06, 2005-2006

The aim of SAPIENS was to develop an intelligent labeling system of autonomous and portable devices for blind people, in order to configure, identify, localize and interact any kind of daily life elements (i.e. clothes, medicines, ...) in a wireless and user-friendly way.

ACCUA

MCT, TIC2003-09179-C02-01, 2003-2004

The aim of ACCUA was to develop intelligent hardware devices which were able to make tasks following a cooperative control scheme and to implement user-friendly and non-invasive interfaces for the control, monitoring and supervision through interne