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Medication adherence is essential for the success of home care. However, it is hard to achieve in reality. In this paper, we propose a bidirectional medication assistance system that is composed of a sensor-enabled pill box and a photo message system. While most of the existing medication assistance systems enhance medication adherence by properly alerting the patients; our bidirectional system does it by the enhancement of information sharing and communications between patients and medical staff. The medication dosage states of a patient are detected by a hall-effect sensor attached to the lid of an off-the-shelf pill box. The sensor data is transferred over a ZigBee network located in the patient’s home and is stored in a cloud database through a 3G mobile network. Since the raw sensor data might contain erroneous open-close events of the pill box, we developed a data filtering function to eliminate the false-positive events. With the data filtering function, we improved the accuracy of medication monitoring from 60% to 85% during our three-month experiment involving seven patients. In addition, we evaluated the effectiveness of the photo message system that home visiting nurses can use to communicate with the patient. The missed medication ratio was improved from 15% to 4% after the photo message system was installed. The effectiveness of the photo message system continued for two months after the initiation. We also interviewed 15 medical staff about the effectiveness of the medication monitoring with the sensor-enabled pill box and the photo message system.

Aims/Introduction: In the present study, whether near‐future glycated hemoglobin (A1C) levels could be predicted by changes in glycated albumin (GA) levels before and after treatment for diabetes was investigated.

Aims/Introduction: Fulminant type 1 diabetes mellitus (FT1DM) develops as a result of very rapid and almost complete pancreatic β‐cell destruction. We hypothesized that in patients with FT1DM who have less endogenous insulin secretion, disease progression is more rapid, and thus glycated albumin (GA) levels are lower. This study was designed to prove this hypothesis.

Aims/Introduction: Serum glycated albumin (GA) and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) are influenced by plasma glucose levels, and are used for monitoring chronic glycemic control in diabetic patients. Both glycated proteins are known to be influenced by various factors other than plasma glucose levels. In the present study, we examined the effects of hypertriglyceridemia on them.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) devices and related technologies have received a great deal of attention for their ability to perform non-contact object identification. Systems incorporating RFID have been evaluated from a variety of perspectives. The authors constructed a networked RFID system to support event management at NetWorld+Interop 2004 Tokyo, an event that received 150,000 visitors. The system used multiple RFID readers installed at the venue and RFID tags carried by each visitor to provide a platform for running various management and visitor support applications. This paper presents the results of this field trial of RFID readability rates. It further addresses the applicability of RFID systems to visitor management, a problematic aspect of large-scale events.

The small GTPase Rab family, which cycles between GTP-bound active and GDP-bound inactive states, plays an important role in membrane trafficking. Among them, Rab5 is involved in early endocytic pathway, and several Rab5-binding proteins have been identified as regulators or effectors to coordinate the docking and fusion processes of endocytic vesicles. We describe a novel binding protein exhibiting unique biochemical properties for Rab5. The Rab5-binding protein enhances GDP-GTP exchange reaction on Rab5 but preferentially interacts with its GTP-bound form. Gel filtration and immunoprecipitation analyses indicate that the Rab5-binding protein functions as a tetramer composed of anti-parallel linkage of two parallel dimers. These results suggest that the newly identified protein may function as an upstream activator and/or downstream effector for Rab5 in endocytic pathway. Possible roles of the quaternary structure have been discussed in terms of the Rab5-mediated signaling.

The Internet as a basis for Real-Time Kinematic (RTK) and differential Global Positioning System (DGPS) service provides many advantages for worldwide GPS users. Among these advantages are service unification, open architecture, bidirectional communication, and scalability. The current development of this service allows users to use RTK and DGPS through the Internet with conventional accuracy over the short and medium baselines. The perspective for this service lies in the field of wide-area augmentation systems (WASS). At this stage of the Internet-based RTK and DGPS service project, the general concept, system components, draft standards, and software are developed. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.