Host: The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
Name : [in Japanese]
Date : September 03, 2023 - September 06, 2023
The purpose of this research is to develop a posture estimation method of nursing care givers using plantar pressure distribution. Because nursing care with improper posture can cause some diseases like a lower back pain, care givers had better be instructed about a proper posture of a nursing care in advance. Some researches of posture estimation of care givers have been conducted; nevertheless some sensors were required to be attached to the care givers’ bodies for the motion measurements. Conversely, our proposed posture estimation method does not require any sensors to be attached to the body; a pressure sensor sheet is only required to be settled under the nursing care area, and the posture is estimated from the plantar pressure distribution. That is, the positions of the feet and the height trend of the lower back are estimated from plantar pressure distribution by using a principal component analysis and a summation of the pressure distribution, respectively. In the experiments, a participant’s lifting up motion of a weight were conducted, and the postures of the participant were estimated by using the proposed method under the assumption that a care giver assisted a care recipient who moved from a bed to a wheelchair. As a result, the positions, the orientations of each foot and the height trend of the lower back of the care giver were estimated correctly.
