Year 2 Pilots

Grant Funding: R41 AG092119

Continuation of VR technology development focused on the caregiver side of the dyad. Public Health Relevance Statement: The VR-CARES project is an innovative, collaborative effort that invites home health dementia caregivers into the design process of a virtual reality platform seeking to mitigate their work-related burden and social isolation by cultivating a virtual community of support. The co-created, caregiver-specific VR platform will serve as a safe, communal space where caregivers can remotely connect with their peers, share fun experiences together, access support, learn self-care and build resilience within a supportive virtual network to enhance their social and mental health and job satisfaction. Central to VR-CARES is the principle of user-led innovation, ensuring that the technology not only serves but is informed and successfully adopted by the very individuals it intends to benefit, an important standard…

Continue ReadingGrant Funding: R41 AG092119

Publication: Predicting Orthostatic Symptoms Using a Multiparameter Wearable Sensor

Authors: Ziad A Elhajjaji, Amar S Basu Abstract Orthostatic disorders affect 30% of older adults and increase the risk for falls. The current diagnostic standard, the blood pressure cuff, cannot capture the rapid, multifaceted dynamics of orthostasis physiology, resulting in frequent underdiagnosis. This paper demonstrates multiparameter, real-time measurement of orthostasis using TRACE, an earlobe mounted wearable developed in our group. In prior work, we demonstrated a novel metric called orthostatic hypovolemia (OHV1), the initial loss in cephalic (head) blood volume immediately upon standing. This study significantly advances our prior work by introducing an additional 2 metrics: OHV2, the cephalic blood volume deficit after the body achieves homeostasis after standing; and postural orthostatic tachycardia (POT), the increase in heart rate. The 3 metrics were evaluated in 101 older adults who wore the TRACE device during postural…

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Award: Recognition as most comprehensive monitoring system for older adults from National Council on Aging (2025)

Experts from the National Council on Aging (NCOA) have selected the Top 5 Home Monitoring Systems for older adults for the year 2025 and Livindi has been named the most comprehensive solution currently on the market. The pros of their solution were noted as the affordability, the variety of sensors available (including bed sensor and activity tracker), accessibility to telehealth, the favorable return policy (30-day return window), connectivity options (both Wi-Fi and cellular), and easy self installation. What they said: "The Livindi home monitoring system works well for people who want to participate in their own health monitoring, as some of the devices, like the weight scale and blood pressure monitor, require users to take their own daily measurements. That said, many of the sensors, like the motion and door monitors, work passively in the…

Continue ReadingAward: Recognition as most comprehensive monitoring system for older adults from National Council on Aging (2025)