Healthy ageing eco-system for people with dementia
MISSION & GOALS
Living with dementia entails various challenges. These challenges can differ to a great extent between people with dementia. In addition, the challenges that people face might change over time, along the course of the disease. Along with the changes in challenges, come differences in the needs of a person with dementia. Large differences exist in the needs and wants as they encounter the different stages of dementia. This is not only complicated for people with dementia themselves, but also for those involved in care tasks. Caregivers and practitioners have to anticipate and prepare for the differences in the person’s needs as the disease progresses.
The overall aim of HAAL is to support people with dementia, their loved ones and care professionals during the different stages of dementia through embedding multiple cares and well-being technologies in an AAL bundle. Partners from the Netherlands, Taiwan, and Italy collaborate and share their experiences in the HAAL project, on the topic of supporting dementia care through state-of-the-art AAL bundles. Each of the aforementioned countries brings several AAL solutions to the table that have been proven effective within existing eco-systems or AAL projects. These solutions are interoperable. Every ecosystem adopts at least one successful solution from the other countries.
The technologies in the AAL bundle offer support for people with dementia, covering a widespread area. These fields of support include social contact, memory aids, training, rehabilitation, monitoring, entertainment and maintaining day structure. Providing such a bundle has the advantage of allowing to a great extent for personalization and flexibility in usage. Two characteristics are highly valuable considering the differing needs and wants between people with dementia as well as the differences over time.
CO-CREATION AND
AN AI-BASED DASHBOARD
The project runs from May 2021 to 2023. People with dementia, their relatives, and care professionals are the focal point for the testing, development, and design. During this period, the team will co-create with these groups to assess the bundle of selected technologies, learn from best practices and eventually develop an online platform that offers the most useful solutions for dementia care.
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Main end-users of the AI-based dashboard: care professionals
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Main outcome: workload reduction & support
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Main USP: data-driven care based on various sensors from the AAL bundle
Vilans Senior Researcher, Henk Herman Nap (HAAL project manager and coordinator) states:
“We plan to work with people with dementia, care professionals, family members, and providers to select the healthcare technologies from the AAL bundle based on demand and needs. We will then try them out within a healthcare setting and gather experiences from the different target groups.”
Distinguished Professor Fong-Chin Su, Medical Device Innovation Center, National Cheng Kung University states:
“We welcome partners for co-sharing and co-creation for the health technologies to protect and promote the public health. We focus on digital health innovation to empower patients and consumers to provide new approaches for facilitating prevention, early diagnosis, and care of diseases.”
Hsin-Ling Tsai, CEO of Silver Linings Global:
“Working with partners from Europe and Taiwan is bringing us a unique opportunity to learn how different societies are supporting people with dementia and their caregivers. We are able to develop a deeper understanding of the needs and wishes of users from different social contexts and to develop new approaches for them.”