In a previous post I discussed the struggles my mentally disabled brother, Callum, faces (The deterioration of an infantile). With a steady increase in his seizure activity and challenging behaviour my mother approached me with an idea for a device that after taking in data about Callum's seizure activity, would be able to draw up some graphs to give her a better method of comparing his current level of seizures to an earlier date.
Now as an Applied Computing student at Dundee University this was a project that interested me, firstly for the fact that I knew it would be of benefit to my mother - along with other carers - and for the challenge. I have only just finished my first year of the BSc course making me less familiar with the development platforms available but I am eager to develop this software as an app. As so many people use a smartphone now it would make the software more accessible to the people who benefit from its use.
After brainstorming some ideas with my mother, I have come up with the following criteria:
Required features:
- Seizure part of device:
- It must be able to input the:
- Type of seizure
- The length of seizure time
- The length of recovery time
- Any triggers (if applicable)
- The surrounding environment as a possible cause
- Any other notes
- Record the date and time automatically of the event
- Take the data and convert them into accessible graphs showing:
- The frequency of all seizures over a given time period
- The frequency of a particular type over a given period
- The comparison of a particular type of seizure with the overall frequency of seizures over a given period
- The frequency of all seizures at a particular time over the course of a day
- The frequency of a particular seizure at a particular time over the course of a day
- A comparison of the frequency of a particular trigger over a period of time
- A comparison of the frequency of a particular surrounding environment over a period of time
Challenging behaviour part of device:
- It must be able to input:
- The length of challenging behaviour time
- Any triggers
- The surrounding environment as a possible cause
- Any other notes
- Record the date and time automatically of the event
- Main signs of challenging behaviour
- Steps taken to try and reduce chance of challenging behaviour (if applicable)
- If steps taken to try and reduce outburst, were they successful?
- The severity of the out burst
- Take the data and convert them into accessible graphs showing:
- The frequency of challenging behaviour over a given time period
- The frequency of a particular severity over a given period
- The comparison of a particular severity of seizure with the overall frequency of seizures over a given period
- The frequency of challenging behaviour at a particular time over the course of a day
- The frequency of a severity at a particular time over the course of a day
- A comparison of the frequency of a particular trigger over a period of time
- A comparison of the frequency of a particular surrounding environment over a period of time
- A comparison of the success rate of a particular step to reduce outburst
- A comparison of the most frequent signs of challenging behaviour
Additional bonus features:
The ability to enable multiple users on a single device through assigning usernames. As many carers work with a multiple of users it would enable carers and parents to use their own personal devices so that a more complete picture is built up. For the purposes of analysis, a psychologist may be given the usernames and password of a particular patient by their parent or guardian. This would enable the psychologist to compare their patients to better suggest a course of action for another family. Also, with a personal profile on the user’s profile, the parent or guardian could enter the medicine and condition that the individual has to enable a comparison for the psychologist of their patients based on medicine to find similar trends. Although it is hoped to have the software available on a portable mainstream device, it is acknowledged that not all families have access to these devices so it is intended for a user friendly website to be set up in order for the parents to input, compare and update the profile information. In order for this to be successful the ability to override the current time and date with one if a parent or guardian is inputting data at a later point after the incident has occurred.
Perhaps in time, with consent of the parent or guardian, a wider comparison may be made from all the input from all devices in order to provide a wider picture to enable carers to try new methods of reducing incidents for the individual. This information would be anonymous and would be in the form of graphs using only the statistical information provided by the carers.
Suggestions
Like I have already said, I am new to the world of coding and development but I have an idea of what I want and am in the process of drawing out screenshots of the software. I would appreciate any suggestions of an approach to develop this idea. If anyone has any other suggestions for more aspects of the advice, please don’t hesitate to comment below. As this software is intended for improving the lives of the family members and providing a means of comparison, I want to include as many positive aspects as possible. My boyfriend, a fourth year applied student, has agreed to assist me with the coding of the software but we would welcome any other help regardless of where you are based. My goal is to make this affordable and accessible to as many families as possible. Watch this space for more information.