Adaptive assistance: Smart home nursing

Abstract

Home nursing gains in significance with the human age being prolonged. More and more people reach the state when they need some assistance in order to live independently at their own. However, home nursing is a resource demanding activity stretching medicare to its limits. In this situation, new technology can help. Reflective assistance is concerned with the construction of flexible 'smart' systems that control the eldercare environment, adapting the ambient to the needs of individuals. New technology transforms a living space to a helpful residence assistant that observes inhabitants and offers aid or calls for it in the case of need. To achieve this goal, systems must be capable of monitoring the behavior of the elderly people and of responding to dynamic changes in their performance or physical and psychological situation. This paper describes an approach to design and develop a home ambient that offers medicare, mobile monitoring, rehabilitation exercises and improved comfort of elderly inhabitants. © 2012 ICST Institute for Computer Science, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering.