Daily Medication Storage and Dispensing Unit

Ed Curley

Akilah Hugine

Objective

Many individuals with memory/cognitive issues and physical disabilities are required to take a complex daily schedule of medications.

The goal of this project is to help elderly or disable patients be able to take their medication in an efficient and timely manner.

Patient Issues with taking Prescriptions Making sure they have the correct prescription How to make up a missed dosage Reminder to take medication Changing pills in Emergency Pill Box Dealing with taking multiple medications Ensuring patient is taking medication correctly Prescription refill notification Being able to crush pills Storing pills in a dark place

Methods to track when user takes medicine Sensing whether the lid is open or closed

Metal contacts on lid and case Sensing changes in contents

Light sensorsWeight

Time Awareness Functionality available in most processors

Notification Methods Light

LED’s will be very useful to use in the design project, since it is a light source that uses very little power.

Sound Helps to alert the user when and give instructions of taking medication.

Visual (LCD) LCD display has an capacity of 16 characters per line, helpful in displaying

instructions for patients medication.

Vibration Vibration will be a great notification method, especially in environments

where audio will become a distraction. The use of vibration is very power intensive.

Cell Phone/PDA User will be notified via cell phone or PDA when it is time to take medication.

Verifying Patient has Correct Medication

Essential that the correct prescription goes to the right patient

This can be accomplished by using an RFID tag/label and reader system

Pharmacist can program smart label and attach to the patient’s pill bottle

Overview of Medical Dispensing System Based on decisions made from research,

we found that the main 3 components of the system are :Pill BottlePortable Pill BoxStationary Unit

Pill Bottle

Block diagram of Overall System Medical Dispenser

Stationary UnitPortable Pill Box

Ensures right medication, using RFID label & reader

Dispenses medicationto pill box, using RFIDSmart cards

Tell when medicationis running low, throughweight sensors or counters

Can store data from portablepill box, serve as a beaconto transfer data from onecomponent to another

Alerts patientwhen and how to take medication, throughvisual, audio, & vibration

Ensures patient istaking medication,by speech or weight sensors

Physicians canfollow up on patient

Serve as recharging station for pill box

Hardware

Objective: Create system to test notification methods and times

Components: Fox 11 Trainer kit LED driver and 9 LEDs 2 pill boxes

Implementation Role in larger system

Picture goes Here

Future Work

Test notifications on user’s to find the best method.

Test decision applications made on the system. Develop hardware for each component of the

system. Explore other technologies to implement with the

system.