Abstract. We are developing a personal activity recognition system that is practical, reliable, and can be incorporated into a variety of health-care related applications ranging from personal fitness to elder care. To make our system appealing and useful, we require it to have the following properties: (i) data only from a single body location needed, and it is not required to be from the same point for every user; (ii) should work out of the box across individuals, with personalization only enhancing its recognition abilities; and (iii) should be effective even with a cost-sensitive subset of the sensors and data features. In this paper, we present an approach to building a system that exhibits these properties and provide evidence based on data for 8 different activities collected from 12 different subjects. Our results indicate that the system has an accuracy rate of approximately 90% while meeting our requirements. We are now developing a fully embedded version of our system based on a cell-phone platform augmented with a Bluetooth-connected sensor board.

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Background Accelerometery and other sensing technologies are important tools for physical activity measurement. Engineering advances have allowed developers to transform clunky, uncomfortable, and conspicuous monitors into relatively small, ergonomic, and convenient research tools. New devices can be used to collect data on overall physical activity and in some cases posture, physiological state, and location, for many days or weeks from subjects during their everyday lives. In this review article, we identify emerging trends in several types of monitoring technologies and gaps in the current state of knowledge. Best practices The only certainty about the future of activity sensing technologies is that researchers must anticipate and plan for change. We propose a set of best practices that may accelerate adoption of new devices and increase the likelihood that data being collected and used today will be compatible with new datasets and methods likely to appear on the horizon. Future directions We describe several technology-driven trends, ranging from continued miniaturization of devices that provide gross summary information about activity levels and energy expenditure, to new devices that provide highly detailed information about the specific type, amount, and location of physical activity. Some devices will take advantage of consumer technologies, such as mobile phones, to detect and respond to physical activity in real time, creating new opportunities in measurement, remote compliance monitoring, data-driven discovery, and intervention.

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Cutaneous abnormalities in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) receiving hemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis may demonstrate signs of their underlying condition or reveal associated disease entities. While a thorough examination of the scalp, skin, mucosa, and nails is integral to establishing a diagnosis, certain conditions will resolve only with dialysis or improvement of their renal disease and others may not require or respond to treatment. Half and half nails, pruritus, xerosis, and cutaneous hyperpigmentation are common manifestations in ESRD. With hemodialysis, uremic frost is no longer prevalent in ESRD patients and ecchymoses have decreased in incidence. Acquired perforating dermatoses are seen in over one-tenth of hemodialysis patients. Metastatic calcinosis cutis and calciphylaxis are both rarely reported, although the latter is seen almost exclusively in the setting of hemodialysis. Diagnosis of nephrogenic systemic fibrosis has historically been challenging; as such, new diagnostic criteria have been proposed. Blood porphyrin profiles are needed to differentiate between porphyria cutanea tarda and pseudoporphyria. We will review and provide an update on the aforementioned common cutaneous manifestations of ESRD in patients receiving dialysis.

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