Sleep Monitoring: Enriching the Traditional Approach by Sensor-collected Data

This paper describes a new approach to studying sleep quality. The approach combines subjective (obtained through paper questionnaires) and objective (obtained through sensors) measures to monitor sleep quality more accurately and easily.We consider some of the major measures traditionally used to monitor sleep quality, such as PSQI (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index); we then introduce a general architecture of the approach to collect, in a hybrid way, data from paper questionnaires (via a mobile application) and sensors. We validate the approach considering the PSQI questionnaire and identify different questions for which we analyze data obtained from a bed sensor (Murata SCA11H) located under the mattress.We collect over a two-month long period both subjective and objective measures and compare the measures considering different questions of the PSQI questionnaire (the questionnaire, referred to a one-month long period, is collected every two weeks). Results confirm the feasibility of the proposed approach. This hybrid approach is expected to lead to a richer dataset, helpful in identifying sleeping disorders and monitoring the overall quality of sleep. Moreover, the approach helps the patient to fill in already validated paper questionnaires, by estimating their answers analyzed through the patterns detected in the data from the sensors.