A French–Greek Cross-Site Comparison Study of the Use of Automatic Video Analyses for the Assessment of Autonomy in Dementia Patients

Abstract

Background: At present, the assessment of autonomy in daily living activities, one of the key symptoms in Alzheimer’s disease (AD), involves clinical rating scales. Methods: In total, 109 participants were included. In particular, 11 participants during a pre-test in Nice, France, and 98 participants (27 AD, 38 mild cognitive impairment—MCI—and 33 healthy controls—HC) in Thessaloniki, Greece, carried out a standardized scenario consisting of several instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs), such as making a phone call or preparing a pillbox while being recorded. Data were processed by a platform of video signal analysis in order to extract kinematic parameters, detecting activities undertaken by the participant. Results: The video analysis data can be used to assess IADL task quality and provide clinicians with objective measurements of the patients’ performance. Furthermore, it reveals that the HC statistically significantly outperformed the MCI, which had better performance compared to the AD participants. Conclusions: Accurate activity recognition data for the analyses of the performance on IADL activities were obtained.

Keywords

• smart home
• dementia
• ambient assisted living
• assistive technology
• sensors
• remote monitoring