# Voice Assistant Application for Avoiding Sedentarism in Elderly People Based on IoT Technologies
## 2 Background
### Smart Bracelets for Sedentarism Tracking  
According to a study developed by the World Health Organization [30], chronic diseases will account for almost three-quarters of all deaths worldwide. These diseases could be prevented through a healthy diet, avoidance of unhealthy products like alcohol and/or tobacco, and regular physical activity [31]. However, many people tend to have a sedentary life [32]. This situation is worrying especially in elderly people.  
Therefore, it is important to monitor elderly people to promote physical activity to those who have a more sedentary life. There are several solutions to achieve the monitoring task, from video monitoring [33] and smart home monitoring [34] to microsensors. The microsensors solution provides a less intrusive solution and is much cheaper than the other solutions. These microsensors, like smart bracelets, can be placed anywhere. Additionally, this solution has already been tested to analyze body movements in the elderly [35]. Furthermore, the use of a smart bracelet does not suppose a big challenge to the elderly; it is like a watch and it does not require any action from the user. Thus, it seems like a perfect solution for monitoring.  
Smart bracelets allow to measure and control several variables. Hereafter, we mention some of these attributes:  
* Fall detection and gait/balance analysis: Falling is a common issue that elderly people must deal with. The time that a person remains on the floor after a tough fall can be crucial to his/her life, and many older people have difficulties standing up when they fall. Hence, and thanks to smart bracelets, it is possible to detect fall detection and gait/balance analysis. Several studies have been carried out during the last years [36; 37; 38]. These systems can help elderly people and reduce the secondary effects of many falls'.
* Sleep Analysis: It is possible to monitor sleep. Many elderly people develop dysfunctional sleep patterns that can cause problems in their daily life. Smart bracelets can detect and notify users about their sleeping activities [39; 40].
* Sedentary/activity monitoring: Smart bracelets can measure the number of steps that the user performs during the day [41; 42]. They can measure the activity and sedentarism. This monitoring also allows measuring the energy expenditure of the user during the day [43]. Activity and energy expenditure monitoring allow the user to be aware of their daily life's rhythm so they can avoid diseases like obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus.
* Location Awareness: Indoor and outdoor locations can be obtained through different techniques, such as GPS, wearable cameras, and other wireless communication technologies (Wi-Fi, BLE, RFID, etc.) [44]. This information can be also useful to monitor the activity of the user or to detect if they are at home or not.  
Our work focuses on the last two points to deal with sedentarism in elderly people. A voice assistant interface notifies the user in the case where less activity was performed than was expected. All the previous works do not provide this novel interface that requires no interaction at all with the smart bracelet. Therefore, our work proposes these new notification alerts for elderly people.