Towards a Low-Cost Companion Robot for Helping Elderly Well-Being

Abstract

The use of robot assistants and companion robots has been shown to improve the well-being of the elderly, enabling them to improve their quality of life. Nowadays, many older people live alone and do not have the resources to acquire specialized systems to monitor and accompany them. But at the same time, they are under the supervision of specialized personnel that make them feel safe. Loneliness can be a crucial element that affects many people’s lives; not having someone to talk to or hang out with is a current concern. This work explores this issue by developing a small companion robot and a heart signal monitoring system (ECG). The presented approach is inexpensive, easy to maintain, and integrates machine learning (ML) models and the Alexa voice assistant.