Developing the WeWALK Smart Cane's Novel Mobility Tracking System for the Monitoring and Diagnostics of Age-Related Mobility Problems

There are 12 million elderly people in the UK, many of whom are likely to experience reduced mobility resulting from physical, cognitive, or sensory impairment. Some may even experience several conditions at the same time. To combat this, In 2019/20, the total expenditure on adult social care by local authorities was £23.3 billion. Over half of this was spent on people over 65 years old, the majority of this going to those who need physical support.

However, the extent to which each individual is supported in everyday mobility remains unknown and older people continue to experience orientation, mobility, and accessibility challenges.

Building on 10+ years of developing various assistive technology for visually impaired people, WeWALK (SME) have invented a sensor-rich smart cane and smartphone application to help people navigate outdoors. The app has both voice and written instructions, as well as full screen reader compatibility and low vision colour filters and text sizes. It calculates the optimal route for a journey and, when public transport is to be used, it finds out the best options, checks timetables, leads to the nearest station, and ensures taking the right transport vehicle. WeWALK can also automatically describe nearby landmarks on a journey. Moreover, the entire WeWALK app can be controlled through the companion WeWALK smart cane, which also provides obstacle detection through ultrasonic sensing and haptics.

The WeWALK system is now capable of collecting motion data from WeWALK's sensors (accelerometer, gyroscope, compass) and connected smartphone including walking speed, cane swipes, and places visited, but requires further development to actively track and diagnose mobility patterns through analysis of this data.

This is necessary as there are no accurate models for how an older person moves and how their mobility holistically evolves, especially after receiving social care, rehabilitation, or orientation and mobility training. Therefore, healthcare, government, and mobility specialists cannot effectively determine if intervention has had benefit. WeWALK's novel system aims to be implemented and expanded organically through daily usage. However, there will first need to exist rigorous data collection and user testing, followed by data manipulation and classification.

Through a human-centred design approach to exhaustively review the indicators of mobility problems in older people and beyond, WeWALK will develop and refine its smartphone and smartcane's ability to recognise these through daily usage. This will ultimately allow older people, or anyone experiencing mobility challenges, to better understand their progression, assisting healthcare and the end-user alike.