Monitoring and analysis of sleep pattern for people with early dementia

An altered sleep pattern is often one of the general symptoms experienced by people with dementia. The quantity and quality of sleep may be a reflection of their dementia condition and affect the quality of life for people with dementia. In this paper we present our research in using sensor based technology for a telecare service to monitor daily activities over a period of three months for one healthy elderly client and one client with early dementia using assistive technology. We analyze their sleep patterns, propose a set of measures to assess the quantity and quality of sleep, and visualize the sleep patterns for a telecare service provider and carers to support users with dementia. Results show that people with early dementia have more alternations of sleep-wake cycles than healthy elderly people, and assistive technology can provide objective and ubiquitous monitoring of sleep patterns for health care purposes.