EYE MOVEMENT CONTROLLED PERIPHERALS FOR THE HANDICAPPED-PARALYZED PEOPLE AND ALS PATIENTS

Controlling some devices in their daily life for the handicapped-paralyzed people and ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) patients is an important challenge. In this study, a wearable system, called SmartEyes, is developed. The system is controlled by the eye movements of the user. With the help of this system, two groups of facilities are provided. The first is: communicating with predefined voiced messages, valuable especially for people who are unable to talk, and the second is: controlling some peripherals which are in the range around the user. The novelty of the developed system is that it navigates among the menus by means of the eye movements with the help of synthesized voice messages and without a need to sit across a monitor. In the control part, both the infrared (IR) and radio frequency (RF) wireless technologies were employed. The details of the peripheral control operations, namely: controlling the desk light, rolling curtain, TV, air conditioner and the sickbed, are explained in detail. The test results show that the system works quite satisfactorily in tracing and implementing the commands given by the user’s pupil gaze directions. We found that the overall satisfaction is quite high by yielding a total average survey score of 4.7 out of 5. We believe that the developed system offers a practical and efficient solution for making the lives of handicapped-paralyzed people and ALS patients easier. We carry on improving the skills of our SmartEyes system.