Evaluating an Accelerometer-based System for Spine Shape Monitoring

In western societies a huge percentage of the population is suffering from some kind of back pain in their life. There are several approaches addressing back pain by postural modifications. Postural training and activity can be tracked by various wearable devices most of which are based on accelerometers. We present research on the accuracy of accelerometer-based posture measurements. To this end, we took simultaneous recordings of an optical motion capture system and a system consisting of five accelerometers in three different settings: On a test robot, in a template, and on actual human backs. We compare the accelerometer-based spine curve reconstruction against the motion capture data.