Social acceptance by elderly people of a fall-detection system with range sensors in a nursing home

This study developed a fall detection system for elderly people in a nursing home and investigated their acceptance of it. The system obtained their positions and heights from range sensors and used that information to correctly detect 89.5% of the falls based on data where the elderly crouched in a mockup room of a nursing home. We investigated the social acceptance with elderly people by comparing three conditions: (1) only detecting out-of-bed, (2) detecting falls in a room and always showing the human position, and (3) detecting falls in a room and only showing the human position when a fall happened. The results showed that intention to use were significantly higher in the second and third conditions than the first condition.