Their every move is monitored, but ...

WALLINGFORD - Sensors keep track of just about everything Shirley Player does in her apartment, but she's not worried that Big Brother is watching. Far from it.

"I feel very safe with it," Player said. "It's nice to know you're being watched."

Player is one of 68 residents of the Masonicare retirement community participating in a study that aims to determine whether keeping a technological eye on seniors can help them live longer independently in their own homes.

Player's place has a motion detector in the corner of each room, a sensor on her refrigerator that keeps track of her eating habits, a sensor on the medicine cabinet to see if she's taking her medications on time, and a pressure sensor underneath the mattress of her bed to track her sleeping. There would have been a sensor on the toilet, except that was determined unfeasible for the study during a pilot program this summer.

Player says her greatest worry is remembering to take the sensor on her key chain with her when she leaves her apartment. Otherwise, she said, after about a month she hardly gives the monitoring program a thought. Does she worry about it?

"I never do," she said.

"If it will help somebody else, that's what my goal is," said the 87-year-old Player, who lives at the Masonic Health Care Center independent living complex, in one of the A. Norman Johnson Apartments.

She's one of 34 residents whose apartments have been outfitted with sensors since early November. Over the next two years, the activity of those seniors, as in doctor's visits, trips to the hospital and nursing homes, will be compared to 34 volunteers who will spend the two years without sensors.

The study will also compare the functioning of the two groups, determined by such daily routines as dressing, bathing and cooking, said Catherine Meriano, a professor of occupational therapy at Quinnipiac University who is one of the lead investigators in the study.

Two years was deemed necessary, because the residents of the retirement community tend to do well on their own, and it may take a while for the study to show any clear differences, Meriano said.

While the technology may seem invasive when it comes to privacy, it's at least not at the level of camera monitoring, Meriano said. "We were trying to go with the least invasive," she said.

Reducing hospital visits and nursing home admissions could potentially save a lot of money, said Brian Bischoff, president and chief executive of Healthsense Inc., a Minnesota-based company that specializes in technological aging services. "What we're finding is that when they get the technology, it pays back quickly," he said.

With the advancing age of the so-called baby boom generation and increased life expectancy, more than 54 million Americans 65 and older are expected by 2020.

For companies such as Healthsense, such projections entail no shortage of potential customers.

"It's giant, actually," Bischoff said.

Bischoff said his company's wireless sensor technology has been in place for several years, but that this is the first time a "detailed study tracking independent groups" has attempted to measure the difference it can make.

Anecdotal information suggests the difference can be impressive, Bischoff said.

"There are many examples of rescues, where the technology has identified the need for help," he said.

Sensors in each residence generate about 10 pages of data per day, which is analyzed by computer for red flags, which could be an indication, for example, that a resident had not opened the medicine cabinet during a given day.

"What we look for in the data is changes in your normal pattern," said Jim Albert, Masonicare's chief information officer and vice president of information services.

Should the monitoring detect a change in Player's daily routine, for example, Barbara Sicignana, director of residential care, could then make a more detailed inquiry about potential problems. The aim is early detection and intervention, Albert said.

"What we're trying to do is be proactive," he said.

Most residents adapt very quickly, he said. "We find it becomes invisible after about two weeks," Albert said. "Some residents quicker than others."

"It's all relatively passive, I don't think we've had anybody express Big Brother worries," he said.

Healthsense's system, called eNeighbor, was developed with the help of a grant from the National Institute of Aging. The system uses a standard WiFi network, which has the side effect of bringing "an economical wireless broadband to a lot of residents," Bischoff said.

Which means the same technology allowing a peek in, also enables a look out.