WeCare: Assistive Solution for Severe Speech and Motion Impairment People

摘要

Common disabilities that Minamata and stroke patients share are the motion and speech impairments. The patients inflicted with these two critical impairments are devoid of the ability to carry out their basic needs. In many countries, siblings or relatives are normally the group of people who provide the caregiving for home-based patients whereas in day-care centers and hospitals, nurses are the ones who are responsible to provide caregiving to them. However, caregiving process can be stressful and exhausting especially when other siblings or responsible caregivers could not provide the essential support. In this paper, we present an assistive solution for severe speech and motion impairment people called WeCare. WeCare presents an idea that allows such patients to communicate using Leap Motion. Leap Motion is a new technology that can detect hand motion at high precision and thus it can be used to allow people with motion and speech impairments to put minimum effort in conveying messages. Besides, WeCare features a smart speech synthesis and menu customization as well as tracking and recording of medical history in order to provide a complete support in terms of personal care for the people with disabilities by tracking their meal, body temperature, heartbeat, blood pressure and required medicine wherever necessary. Moreover, this cloud based mobile application also provides social interaction and caregiving coordination which enhances caregiving experience and creates a livelier environment for the patients and caregivers. Patients can interact with their social group (caregivers, other patients and friends) through some interactive functions embedded in WeCare such as messaging and interactive drawing board.