skip to main content


Title: Smart Cup for a Smart Pill Dispenser for Verification of Pill Consumption
This research paper describes the design of a device that can assist seniors or people with physical or cognitive limitations to take their prescribed medications that are in the form of pills on time while verifying that such pills have been actually consumed. The design consists of a portable smart pill dispenser that will rest on a base, allowing it to dispense pills into a smart cup. The smart pill dispenser uses a stepper motor to rotate to a desired pills based on a specific time slot/day of the week. The smart cup attached to the pill box uses an accelerometer, gyroscope, and an IR proximity sensor to detect if a user is taking the medication by how much the smart cup is lifted and tilted. The smart cup will inform the smart pill dispenser if the pills are properly consumed or not, thus, allowing the device to potentially aid the patients to have a healthier life.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2125654
NSF-PAR ID:
10466540
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
IEEE
Date Published:
Page Range / eLocation ID:
0994 to 0998
Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
["Accelerometer","Gyroscope","IR proximity Sensor","Wireless Charging","Portable Assistive Technology","Arduino Connect","IMU"]
Format(s):
Medium: X
Location:
Las Vegas, NV, USA
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. This research paper describes the design of a pill dispensing device that can assist people with physical or cognitive limitations in taking their prescribed medications. The design is based on the communication between two devices for the purpose of dispensing pills at a scheduled time and identifying if these pills had been properly consumed within a specified time frame. The two devices are based on Arduino RP2040 connect microcontrollers and implement several sensors in the aid of dispensing and detecting of pill consumption. The sensors implemented are an IMU, and distances sensors, such as an ultrasonic sensor and an IR proximity sensor, additionally a real time clock module and stepper motor have been included in the design for the scheduling and dispensing of the pills. The two devices will communicate using Bluetooth for low energy devices (BLE) and the purpose of the devices is to provide aid to the intended target audience in achieving a healthier lifestyle. 
    more » « less
  2. null (Ed.)
    With increasing challenges to health care in the foreseeable future, novel technology solutions are increasingly needed. Meanwhile, biomedical engineers are increasingly asked to develop user-centered solutions (i.e., desired by the end users). Nevertheless, the importance of user-centeredness is often neglected in the innovation process. It remains unclear about the interplay between thinking of solution novelty and desirability in addition to feasibility, and thus it is challenging for biomedical engineering educators to balance the teaching of the above two aspects in a BME design curriculum. This study aims to develop a preliminary version of a user-centered innovation potential assessment instrument applicable to diverse biomedical engineering design projects. The assessment instrument was adapted from File and Purzer (2014)’s definition of innovation potential (1) feasibility (2) viability (3) desirability and (4) novelty. Among these aspects, we focused on assessing feasibility, desirability and novelty, which can be quantified and assigned to each design idea proposed by the students. As the first attempt, we targeted students’ innovation potential in the design prototyping phase. To validate our preliminary development, we gave an in-class design task for smart pill dispenser to 30+ pairs of senior students enrolled in the BME capstone design course. To assess the design ideas, the instructor and his teaching assistant (two of the authors on the paper) applied a thematic analysis. We first identified patterns from the submitted design ideas by extracting key attributes including dispenser’s portability, tracking/reminding capability, safety, and easy to use. We then estimated the frequency and novelty of these key attributes appearing in each design idea and converted each of them to a 5-point scale. Finally, we calculated a composite score for user-centered innovation potential by multiplying the scales on feasibility, desirability and novelty. We believe this study has added value to improving our understanding of user-centered innovation potential in an undergraduate biomedical engineering curriculum. With further development and scaled-up validation, we may be able to use the instrument to provide insights into developing teaching interventions for stimulating user-centered innovative potentials among biomedical engineers. 
    more » « less
  3. Boone, E. ; Thuecks, S. (Ed.)
    The bean beetle, Callosobruchus maculatus (Coleoptera, Chrysomelidae), has become a widely used insect species in undergraduate laboratory education. This species is particularly suitable for course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) due to its short generation time, ease of handling and culturing in the laboratory, and sexual dimorphism in its sedentary phase. Bean beetles complete their growth and development inside a host seed (bean) with at least eight different host species. However, conducting manipulative experiments with bean beetles would be enhanced if it were possible to readily prepare artificial beans on which the beetles could complete their lifecycle. Here, we report on the use of a mechanical pill press (LFA Machines Model TDP-0) to make artificial beans. We prepared artificial beans by making whole blackeye pea flour (Vigna unguiculata) using a coffee grinder. That flour was used in the pill press to make 8mm diameter x 5-9mm thick disk-shaped pills with and without additives. Adult female bean beetles readily laid fertilized eggs on the surface of these artificial beans. Offspring emerged 4-5 weeks later at 25°C, the same development time that would have occurred in natural intact blackeye pea seeds. No special treatments of the artificial beans were required to induce females to lay eggs on them nor for the pills to remain intact during the period of larval and pupal development. This mechanical pill press can produce 30-50 pills per minute, so artificial beans can be produced rapidly in sufficient numbers to conduct meaningful experiments. This simple and effective method for making artificial beans creates the opportunity to conduct studies that have been difficult or impossible in the past.For example, future studies may evaluate treatments such as plant secondary compound concentrations, nutrient content, and antibiotic exposure on bean beetle life history and microbiome communities. 
    more » « less
  4. null (Ed.)
    In this paper, we present the design and implementation of a smart irrigation system using Internet of Things (IoT) technology, which can be used for automating the irrigation process in agricultural fields. It is expected that this system would create a better opportunity for farmers to irrigate their fields efficiently, as well as eliminating the field's under-watering, which could stress the plants. The developed system is organized into three parts: sensing side, cloud side, and user side. We used Microsoft Azure IoT Hub as an underlying infrastructure to coordinate the interaction between the three sides. The sensing side uses a Raspberry Pi 3 device, which is a low-cost, credit-card sized computer device that is used to monitor in near real-time soil moisture, air temperature and relative humidity, and other weather parameters of the field of interest. Sensors readings are logged and transmitted to the cloud side. At the cloud side, the received sensing data is used by the irrigation scheduling model to determine when and for how long the water pump should be turned on based on a user-predefined threshold. The user side is developed as an Android mobile app, which is used to control the operations of the water pump with voice recognition capabilities. Finally, this system was evaluated using various performance metrics, such as latency and scalability. 
    more » « less
  5. Recent advancements in sensors, device manufacturing, and big data technologies have enabled the design and manufacturing of smart wearables for a wide array of applications in healthcare. These devices can be used to remotely monitor and diagnose various diseases and aid in the rehabilitation of patients. Smart wearables are an unobtrusive and affordable alternative to costly and time-consuming health care efforts such as hospitalization and late diagnosis. Developments in micro- and nanotechnologies have led to the miniaturization of sensors, hybrid 3D printing of flexible plastics, embedded electronics, and intelligent fabrics, as well as wireless communication mediums that permit the processing, storage, and communication of data between patients and healthcare facilities. Due to these complex component architectures that comprise smart wearables, manufacturers have faced a number of problems, including minimum sensor configuration, data security, battery life, appropriate user interfaces, user acceptance, proper diagnosis, and many more. There has been a significant increase in interest from both the academic and industrial communities in research and innovation related to smart wearables. However, since smart wearables integrate several different aspects such as design, manufacturing, and analytics, the existing literature is quite widespread, making it less accessible for researchers and practitioners. The purpose of this study is to narrow this gap by providing a state-of-the-art review of the extant design, manufacturing, and analytics literature on smart wearables-all in one place- thereby facilitating future work in this rapidly growing field of research and application. Lastly, it also provides an in-depth discussion on two very important challenges facing the smart wearable devices, which include barriers to user adoption and the manufacturing technologies of the wearable devices. 
    more » « less