Speaker : Johann Havenga

Presentation Title : Wearable Technology in support of safety, health and wellness

WEARABLE TECHNOLOGY LANDSCAPE

Wearable technology is clothing and accessories that incorporate computer and advanced electronic

technologies. The designs often incorporate practical functions and features, but may also have a purely critical

or aesthetic agenda.

Wearable Usage Market Forecast

Predicts 100% increase of wearable units

in next two years. Has called the “Next big

Thing” with sales increase from 5$ Billion

to $50 Billion in 2020.

Wearable Devices Types Meaningful Aggregated Data

Wearable Usage Trends Device Makers Wellness Programs

Commonly used to monitor fitness (movement tracking) . Also

monitor sleep, heart rate, body temperature, blood oxygen level,

respiration, glucose and some cases specialist industry (mining,

security, etc.) applications i.e. fatigue monitoring, body positioning

monitoring, stress level monitoring, alcohol monitoring and fall

detection.

.

Devices are typically in form of bracelet, smart

watch or chest straps that can sync with mobile

phone. Latest innovations are glasses, sensors in pills

and devices and “smart garments” i.e caps, shirts

and pants.

Awareness and usage of wearables are on the rise. 60%

obtained the devices in last 6 months with 15% using it in

daily lives. Half of users between 18 and 34 years (young

and affluent). Fitness band devices (61%) and smart

watches (45%). Device commitment is increasing but one

third of users who obtained more than 12 months ago are

no longer using it today.

.

Future will allow for more open platforms to

allow easier integration (sharing) of fitness,

nutrition, etc. and personal data (personal health

record). Companies will be require summarise

and analyse the data in meaningful ways to

realise value of aggregated data.

Fitness monitoring device makers are expanding

their offerings into corporate wellness

programmes, with participant activity validated

by their devices. It include incentivised rewards

and challenges as well as social interaction

among employees.

Companies provide a communication platform

and rewards for quantified activity including

discounts on merchandise, travel rewards, or

charitable donations (ready to use therapeutic food

to undernourished and malnourished individuals.

Wearable devices is being proven to be a major

catalyst to ensure improved physical fitness and

health. Physical fitness is associated with lower all-

cause mortality due to lower rated of chronic

diseases reducing costs to employers and health

insurers.

Fitness Communities

Effectiveness

TECHNOLOGIES USED TO MONITOR HWW

Built-in

• OEM’s offer a host of critical and non-critical HWW technologies. OEM’s are increasing their R&D budgets substantially in this area and ongoing innovation is taking place.

• OEM’s and vehicle manufacturers realize that not all human conditions can be monitored via the equipment installed in the cab and that wearable devices are required to augment the data collection of the built-in systems. For example, smart watches or wearables are customized for in-vehicle diagnosis for manufacturers who offer an HWW kit, and these wearables are then incorporated and linked with built-in systems.

• Benefits of built-in systems are that these technologies are designed to integrate with the existing systems in the machine. The layout is well planned and the equipment is well integrated with the cab layout and design. Measurement and reporting is integrated with the fleet management systems supports to critical decisions and alarms and warnings are well weighed to support the operator.

TECHNOLOGIES USED TO MONITOR HWW

Brought-in

• OEM’s are competing with niche technology service providers to retro-fit many of the HWW technologies to older equipment.

• Technologies and systems are often not well integrated into the overall vehicle or fleet management systems in terms of driver ergonomics, layout and installation.

• Add-on cameras and equipment to monitor machine operators are often seen as ‘big brother’ watching them.

• Going forward, the proliferation of wearable devices, smartphones, and cloud-based solutions are seen as key and will remain an area of focus and fast growth.

• Benefits of brought-in technologies (and cloud based) relate to lower costs, short-term and rapid realization of the equipment and switching of systems as the technology improves or matures.

EXAMPLES OF WEARABLES

• Heart Rate, HRV (allowing to estimate stress and fatigue), Heart Rate Recovery, and ECG.

• Breathing Rate (RPM), Minute Ventilation (L/min).• Activity intensity, peak acceleration, steps, cadence and sleep

positions

• Single-Lead ECG, Heart Rate, Heart Rate Variability, • Respiratory Rate• Skin Temperature• Body Posture • Fall Detection• Activity including Steps

SENSOR PILL

• A wearable patch monitors the status of the ingestible 1 mm sensor-enabled pill and simultaneously collects data about a users heart rate, temperature, activity and rest patterns throughout their day.

• Resembling a grain of sand and made up mostly of silicon the tiny sensors are packaged in/alongside your pill regiment and are covered in magnesium and copper so that as the pills reach a patients stomach acid can generate enough power through this chemical reaction to communicate a unique time-stamped signal to the patch. The patch stores this number along with the exact time of pill ingestion and forwards that information using Bluetooth along to a users smartphone, with the details eventually ending up being delivered to a patients doctor

EXAMPLES OF WEARABLES FOR MINERS

iWristPhoneiWristPhone was originally designed to address mining challenges in India. "Often, miners are trapped for hours when a hazard takes place. They could skype with doctors and get on-demand medical advice when there is no way out. Video calls can be made to the rescue teams within minutes, something that would otherwise take hours.” Apart from wifi and bluetooth, the wearable has a gravity sensor that can detect miners falling and being trapped, can monitor and record their GPS coordinates every minute and has a three megapixel camera for video calls. It can also measure the heart rate and blood pressure. The mobile application will record the data and can be used by those on the surface to communicate with the miners.

MMS JACKET FOR MINING SAFETY

MMSThe intelligent jacket called the Mobile Monitoring Station was developed after the Chilean mine disaster and is capable of monitoring the worker’s physical conditions and also the environment around the miner. This smart jacket is based on a very simple system: a smartphone, specially designed and equipped to endure the harsh conditions of the mining environment, and sensors that monitor the environment and the worker. The whole system is powered by lithium batteries and Internet-based, working via 3G or Wi-Fi, and can work with different wireless systems to transfer data.

GOOGLE GLAS, MICROSOFT HOLOLENS

Microsoft Hololens and Google Glass provide an experience known as augmented reality, where images are superimposed over what the user sees in real life. With Google Glass, these images are generally icons that provide directions, alert users to messages from contacts or give weather updates. UK surgeons have become the first in the world to use Google Glass in the operating theatre. With MS Hololens it is possible to create a VR, AR environment with multiple applications for planning and safety.

These glasses have many technology applications. Workers are able to look up how products are assembled or ask for help in real-time if they are unsure what to do in the field. One example is to overlay the technical drawings in 3D of a machine while a person is working on it, indicating how a complex part should be removed or repaired.

CHALLENGES FACING BUILT IN OR MACHINE FIXED SYSTEMS• Automation and immersive technology trends indicate that drivers and machine

operators are increasingly operating the machine remotely, in close proximity of the machine or from a control room

• Technology built into the vehicle focusing on the person may become redundant – sunset technology

• Some of the technology used in after-market systems are in-efficient and measuring the person is much more efficient

• It is possible to track and measure various elements (including fatigue) of the machine operator, controllers, processing room controllers, decision-makers and management

CHALLENGES FACING SOME EYE BASED FATIGUE MONITORING SYSTEMS• Many of these systems monitor the state of the operator's eyes. More specifically the state of

the eyelids. When the eyelids remain closed for longer than the period associated with normal blinking, the system identifies this as a micro-sleep spell and alerts the operator via an audio alarm.

• Once the operator's eyes start to close, we believe she or he is already asleep; not only in a state of diminished vigilance.

• It could take 2 seconds for the operator to wake up from this micro sleep - travelling at 40 km/h (11.1 m/s) the wake up time alone translates to over 20 meters of uncontrolled movement of a heavy haul truck. This is not even counting the period of time during which the operator is entering micro-sleep and up to the point where her or his eyes close for a sufficiently long enough period to be identified as micro-sleep.

• We recommend considering a system to monitor carefully selected physiological responses directly (using available non-intrusive wearable technology) to predict spells of decreased vigilance, rather than detecting spells of micro-sleep.

ULOCKING ULTIMATE VALUE – INTEGRATION OF THE WEARBALE DATA WITH OPERATING SYSTEMS

• The key to success does not lie in the wearable device but rather in the use and analysis of the collected data – integrated into the e-Health record of the individual

• We believe that the data collected from the wearable device should not be used in isolation to measure singular events such as fatigue or health. It should be integrated with operational systems and performance data. It should be used to monitor the impact of fatigue and other medical conditions on performance and will contribute to overall improvement of worker safety, health, wellness, wellbeing and performance