2021 IEEE International Conference on Biomedical Engineering, Computer and Information Technology for Health (BECITHCON)
2021 IEEE International Conference on Biomedical Engineering, Computer and Information Technology for Health (BECITHCON) | 978-1-6654-6621-9/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/BECITHCON54710.2021.9893602
Accelerometer-based Convulsive Seizure Detection
using CNN
Erina Binte Motahar*
Department of Biomedical Engineering Department of Biomedical Engineering
Military Institute of Science and Military Institute of Science and
Technology
Dhaka, Bangladesh Dhaka, Bangladesh
erinaoishy@gmail.com farhanishti32@gmail.com
Abstract— Convulsive seizures contribute to a significant
portion of the seizure-associated injuries, accidents, and sudden
unexpected deaths in Epilepsy (SUDEP). An ambulatory seizure
detection system may prevent such accidents and improve the
quality of life. Conventional seizure detection methods require
specialized approaches such as video or EEG analysis, which are
frequently ineffective in non-clinical settings such as during
daily activities. In recent years, a couple of wearable
accelerometer-based seizure detection systems have been
proposed. But the common problem these devices face is low
specificity and high False Alarm Rate (FAR). In this work, we
proposed an improved way to study and classify accelerometer
data using Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to detect
General Tonic Clonic Seizures (GTCS), also known as
Convulsive Seizures. Due to the unavailability of a dataset of
accelerometer data related to seizure movements, an
accelerometer-based wrist-worn data acquisition device was
constructed to develop a dataset mimicking seizure-like
movement. The accelerometer data were then converted to RGB
images for training and testing with three different CNN
architectures: DenseNet, ResNet-50, and VGG16, to determine
which architecture is best suited for these types of data. Among
these three, the DenseNet architecture achieved the highest
accuracy of 99.2%, sensitivity of 98.4%, and specificity of
100%. Hence, an algorithm was developed based on the
DenseNet model to detect convulsive seizures with a feature to
tune according to the patient’s seizure type. The proposed
method can be implemented to develop an ambulatory seizure
monitoring device to detect seizures before accidents occur.
Keywords—Epilepsy, General Tonic Clonic Seizure (GTCS),
Epileptic Seizure Detection, Accelerometer, Convolutional Neural
Network (CNN)
I. INTRODUCTION
Epilepsy can be defined as a neurological disorder where
brain activity becomes unusual, causing recurrent seizures. As
reported by the World Health Organization (WHO), around
49 out of 100,000 people are diagnosed with Epilepsy each
year [1]. Epilepsy is seen all over the world, but most of the
cases (around 80%) are seen in developing countries [2].
According to a survey, there are about 1.5 to 2 million patients
with epilepsy in Bangladesh [3]. Patients with epilepsy suffer
more in developing countries due to social stigma. An
Epileptic Seizure is defined as a period of unusual behavior,
*These authors contributed equally
978-1-6654-6621-9/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE
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Farhan Ishtiaque* Md. Sharjis Ibne Wadud
Department of Biomedical Engineering
Military Institute of Science and
Technology Technology
Dhaka, Bangladesh
sharjis@bme.mist.ac.bd
loss of senses, and uncontrolled muscular movements.
Epilepsy itself is a harmless condition. Though seizures
caused by epilepsy don't harm the patient, they can interrupt
daily life. Also, people with epilepsy may lose their life due to
various accidents that occur while they are experiencing
seizures. This phenomenon is known as SUDEP [4]. The rate
of SUDEP is also very high across the world. A study in the
USA shows the mortality rate of epileptic patients is 11.59 per
million [5]. It is risky to leave epileptic patients unattended.
As the occurrence of seizures is unpredictable, they need to be
kept under constant surveillance. But it is very difficult to
ensure constant surveillance in person. Also, in developing
countries, there is a lack of trained people for the job. So, to
reduce the chances of SUDEP, a fast, reliable, as well as
portable seizure detection and monitoring technology is
required.
Present seizure detection techniques are time-consuming
and mostly require medical settings. Usually, a seizure is
diagnosed by a physician inspecting the EEG of a patient [6].
Another common method is video surveillance, where
multiple cameras observe patients from multiple angles, and
with the help of Artificial Intelligence seizure is detected from
the movements recorded by those cameras [7]. Seizures are
also detected from the EMG of a patient [8]. But these
methods don’t offer portability or wearability, which are
required for ambulatory monitoring of seizures during daily
activities.
Some recent studies are trying to develop a cheap and easy
way to efficiently detect seizures when patients are not in a
hospital. In [9], an accelerometer-based seizure detection
technique was proposed, implementing K-nearest neighbor
(KNN) cluster analysis. But the algorithm only works on
patients with specific types of movement during a seizure,
which makes the method limited to specific types of seizure
patients. Another study proposed a threshold-based detection
method from accelerometer data [10]. But this type of method
suffers from low selectivity and high false alarm rate (FAR),
making its reliability questionable. In another machine
learning-based study, features were extracted from
accelerometer data and classified using Support Vector
Machine (SVM) [11]. This proposed method also suffers from
a high False Alarm Rate. Another accelerometer-based study
promises high sensitivity but low selectivity as it also has the
problem of high FAR [12]. Some state-of-the-art non-EEG-
based seizure detection methods use multiple accelerometer
sensors along with other sensors such as surface EMG
46
(sEMG), Electro-dermal Activity (EDA) sensors to detect
seizures [13], [14]. Although, in some cases, they offer high
sensitivity and low FAR, they come with their limitations.
These sensors are usually affected by external factors such as
motion artifacts, temperature, and humidity, leading to
inconsistent results. On top of that, the addition of many
sensors increases the cost of the device as well as sometimes
compromises the wearer's comfort in daily usage. So, more
study is needed to make the accelerometer-based seizure
detection technique more feasible and reliable as it offers
some benefits over other sensors in terms of cost, portability,
and comfort. Accurate classification of seizure and non-
seizure movements from accelerometer data is one of the
prime concerns at the moment. This concern demands focus
to obtain high sensitivity and specificity in seizure detection.
Taking these into account, the goal of this study was to
find an improved way to study and classify accelerometer data
to detect general tonic-clonic Seizures, which can help
develop a wearable seizure monitoring device to prevent
unexpected death due to epileptic seizures.
II. METHOD
A. Data Acquisition
There were no open-source accelerometer data of seizure
movements available in literature and databases. So, we had
to develop a device to record accelerometer data of seizure-
like movements and non-seizure-like movements. The data
acquisition device was made using ESP8266 NodeMcu,
which is a microcontroller, and a 6DOF Accelerometer
Gyroscope GY-521 (MPU-6050) sensor to record
accelerometer data of seizure and non-seizure movements.
Fig. 1. Hardware layout of the data collection device.
Fig. 3. Some examples of constructed images from accelerometer data. Each image is 256 x 256 pixels and plotted using 50 data points from the dataset.
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The selected accelerometer is equipped with a 16-bit analog
to digital conversion hardware, which gives accurate
vibrational data. Data were primarily stored on a Micro SD
card, which was connected to the system via a Micro SD
module. The device was powered using a DC power bank. The
hardware layout is shown in Fig. 1. A volunteer wore the
device on her wrist. 3-dimensional accelerometer data of daily
activities were recorded and saved on the SD card. Such
activities are as follows – walking, running, jogging, driving,
exercising, etc. Seizure movement data were recorded by
mimicking seizure-like movements. The seizure-like
movements were seen from different videos found on the web
and mimicked by the volunteer. The selected accelerometer
range was 16G, and data were collected at a rate of 50Hz. The
accelerometer has three channels, x, y, and z. So, a single data
point had three values. A similar type of data collection
method was followed in [9] to make a dataset of seizures using
an accelerometer. In total, 184 minutes of data were collected.
The data were then transferred to a computer for further data
processing. The block diagram of our methodology is given in
Fig. 2.
B. Data Pre-processing
For better training and classification of the recorded
accelerometer data of seizure and non-seizure movements, the
data were preprocessed in several steps. First of all, the raw
data had plenty of corrupted values. The corrupted values
were deleted using typecasting method. After that, the raw
data were used to create plots taking 50 data points for each
plot. No overlapping windows were used. The plots were
saved as images of 256x256 pixels. About 9,000 RGB images
were constructed. The sample rate of our dataset was 50 Hz
that means 50 data points were recorded each second.
Fig. 2. Block diagram of methodology.
So, each image represents 1 second of movement. Among
these images, 70% were of non-seizure movement, and 30%
were of seizure movement.
Some examples of the type of images constructed from
seizure and non-seizure-like movement data are shown in Fig.
3. Different types of seizure-like movements are also shown
in Fig. 3.
C. Data Classification
In our problem, we expect the images to have different
complex pattern sequences, which can be used as a feature
for classification. For this purpose, we trained CNN models.
For training, 8500 images were used. 250 images were
separated for testing. Among the 8500 images, 20% were
used for validation, and the rest 80% were used for training.
1) Model Description
We compared three well-known CNN models in this
study. We took DenseNet, VGG16, and ResNet-50 as our
base model. These three models are well-known for their
ability to recognize patterns in images. To implement transfer
learning, we added some extra layers to prepare the model for
our dataset. On top of the base model, we added a Global-
Average Pooling layer which replaces the fully connected
layer and creates a feature map for each category. After that,
we added a dense layer with activation function Relu and
another dense layer with activation function Softmax with
two binary classifiers as non-seizure and seizure. A dropout
layer of 50% was added in between to eliminate overfitting.
The model’s layout is shown in Fig. 4.
(a)
(b)
(c)
Fig. 4. CNN architectures with added layers are used for the classification of the images. (a) DenseNet architecture with added layers. (b) VGG16
architecture with added layers. (c) ResNet-50 architecture with added layers.
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2) Model Training
We trained the models with a batch size of 4 for a total of
15 Epochs, each with an ADAM optimizer with a learning
rate of 1e-5 to enhance the CNN ability in classification, and
used Categorical Cross-Entropy as our loss function. A
reduced learning rate was introduced in case validation
reached a plateau. These hyperparameters were selected
using trial and error.
3) Model Testing
After training, the models were tested using 250 images
belonging to 2 classes, namely seizure and non-seizure
movements.
4) Hardware Specification
A GTX 1050 Ti 4GB DDR4 GPU was used to train the
models.
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A. Model Evaluation Metrics
To find out which model performs best, we evaluated the
models based on three parameters; accuracy, sensitivity, and
specificity. Accuracy (Acc) is defined as the percentage of the
correctly predicted output of the model. Sensitivity (Se)
evaluates the percentage of how many times the model can
correctly predict seizure events if only seizure events are given
as inputs. Specificity (Sp) is the estimation of the percentage
of how many times the model can correctly predict non-
seizure events when only non – seizure events are given as
inputs. In order to calculate these parameters, we need four
pieces of information [15]. These are,
  True-Positive (TP): Successfully predicted a
Seizure like movement.
 True-Negative (TN): Successfully predicted a
non-Seizure movement.
 False-Positive (FP): Falsely predicted a Seizure
like movement.
 False-Negative (FN): Falsely predicted a non-
Seizure movement.
dataset. The DenseNet model’s confusion matrix is shown in
Fig. 5(b). From the figure, we can see the model outputs 2
false negatives and 0 false positives.
For the VGG16 model, the best accuracy while training
was found about 99.69%. The best validation accuracy was
99.2%. The accuracy per epoch graph is given in Fig. 6(a).
where the best accuracy was at epoch 11. The confusion
matrix of the test is shown in Fig. 6(b). The model outputs five
false negatives and 0 false positives, as seen in the figure.

The three metrics are defined in the following: For the ResNet-50 model, the best accuracy while training
was 99.95%. The best validation accuracy was 99.33%. The
accuracy per epoch graph is given in Fig. 7(a). The increasing
( ) accuracy of the model per epoch can be seen in the figure. The
% of Accuracy = × 100 (1)
( ) confusion matrix of the test on the ResNet-50 model is
presented in Fig. 7(b). In this case, the model outputs five
false-negative and 1 false positive.
% of Specificity = × 100 (2)
( ) Using the confusion matrices, we calculate the evaluation
parameters of the three models. The evaluation results of the
models are presented in Table 1. From the table, it is clear that
% of Sensitivity = × 100 (3) DenseNet is the best performing model as it offers the highest
( ) accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity.

B. Model Evaluation SUMMARIZED EVALUATION METRICS

For the DenseNet model, the best accuracy while training
Model Acc (%) Se (%) Sp (%)
was found about 99.75%. The best validation accuracy was
99.63%. The accuracy per epoch graph shows the DenseNet 99.2% 98.4% 100%
improvement of the model at each epoch. The graph is shown VGG16 98% 96% 100%
in Fig. 5(a). Here we can see the best validation accuracy
ResNet-50 97.6% 96% 99.2%
occurred in epoch 5. The confusion matrix of a test of a model

(a) (b)

Fig. 5. (a) Accuracy vs Epoch curve for DenseNet model. (b) Confusion Matrix for DenseNet model.

(a) (b)

Fig. 6. (a) Accuracy vs Epoch curve for VGG16 model. (b) Confusion Matrix for VGG16 model.

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 (a)
Fig. 7. (a) Accuracy vs Epoch curve for ResNet-50 model. (b) Confusion Matrix for ResNet-50 model.
C. Seizure Detection Algorithm
Among the three models that were used for training, the
DenseNet model performed relatively well. Hence, we
selected the DenseNet model to develop an algorithm that
predicts a Seizure event by taking multiple images as input.
As each image represents 1 second of seizure or non-seizure-
like wrist movement, the multiple images (‘n’ number of
images) represent the last ‘n’ seconds of wrist movements.
Using this data, the algorithm predicts if a seizure has occurred
or not. The developed algorithm uses a parameter (‘s’) to
determine if a seizure has occurred or not. The value of ‘s’
ranges from 1 to ‘n’, which can be set before implementation.
The algorithm finds how many pictures are detected as
seizures and compares the number with the value of ‘s’. Then,
using a simple if-else condition, the model outputs if a seizure
has occurred or not. Thus, by changing the value of ‘s’, we can
control the sensitivity of the algorithm. We can also change
the value of ‘n’ to tune the algorithm. This makes the
algorithm robust. As we know, Seizure events vary a lot from
patient to patient; this allows us to prepare the algorithm
according to a particular patient. The working procedure of the
algorithm is given in Fig. 8.
D. Discussion
In this paper, we evaluated Convolutional Neural Network
as a tool for Convulsive Seizure Detection. We chose an
accelerometer as our sensor because it is inexpensive and easy
Fig. 8. Workflow of the algorithm. The algorithm outputs Non-Seizure or Seizure based on the given input.
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(b)
to integrate into embedded systems, making it ideal for
developing IoT devices. The accelerometer data which were
recorded have three channels. Simple Machine Learning
techniques such as SVM, kNN, and others can be used to
classify such data. However, as previous studies have shown,
the main problem with such techniques is their high False
Alarm Rate. That's why we investigated whether CNN could
be used to detect convulsive seizures.
The data that we used for seizures were recorded by
mimicking the movements of convulsive seizures. This type
of dataset will not 100% accurately represent a patient having
a convulsive seizure but is sufficient to evaluate a model’s
performance as it has been done in many literatures
previously.
The three different models used for classifying the dataset
had satisfactory performance, proving the viability of the
method for future research to detect a convulsive seizure. In
the future, we plan to take data from real patients having
seizures and use those to train CNN models. Such models
should outperform current seizure detection methods based on
our research.
IV. CONCLUSION
In this work, we proposed an effective convulsive seizure
classification method using a two-dimensional convolutional
neural network from seizure and non-seizure-like wrist
movement data. Due to the unavailability of such datasets, we
developed a wrist-worn device equipped with an
accelerometer sensor to create a dataset of seizure and non-
seizure-like movements. The seizure-like movements were
mimicked by seeing videos of the movements of patients
experiencing a seizure. The dataset was trained using three
different CNN models to determine which model suited the
best. The models were evaluated against three performance
metrics: accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity. Among the
three models, the best performing model was DenseNet, with
99.2% accuracy, 100% specificity, and 98.4% sensitivity. The
model did not output any false-positive results, which makes
the method viable for accurate seizure detection. Hence, based
on the DenseNet model, an algorithm was designed with two
controllable parameters to tune the algorithm according to the
patient’s seizure types. The proposed method could help
develop a wearable seizure detection device for epileptic
patients to prevent unexpected death, thus making epileptic
patients' lives much easier and safer.
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