Towards the prevention of pressure ulcers with a wearable patient posture monitor based on adaptive accelerometer alignment.

Pressure ulcers are a serious problem affecting over a million patients every year. Despite accepted guidelines for assessing and repositioning high-risk patients, the prevalence of pressure ulcers continues to rise. This paper presents a wearable, wireless vital sign monitor capable of continuously measuring the duration and orientation of a patient's posture throughout the patient's stay in a hospital.