A Systematic Review on the Use of Wearable Body Sensors for Health Monitoring: A Qualitative Synthesis

Abstract

The use of wearable body sensors for health monitoring is a quickly growing field with the potential of offering a reliable means for clinical and remote health management. This includes both real-time monitoring and health trend monitoring with the aim to detect/predict health deterioration and also to act as a prevention tool. The aim of this systematic review was to provide a qualitative synthesis of studies using wearable body sensors for health monitoring. The synthesis and analysis have pointed out a number of shortcomings in prior research. Major shortcomings are demonstrated by the majority of the studies adopting an observational research design, too small sample sizes, poorly presented, and/or non-representative participant demographics (i.e., age, gender, patient/healthy). These aspects need to be considered in future research work.