Smart & Social Home Care | supporting well-being in the elderly at home

‘Smart & Social Home Care’ is a research & development project funded by Innoviris, with as its main goal the building of a new innovative secure and privacy-preserving smart home system that can be used to support the health and well-being of aging people living in their own homes. 

Context

The population is aging, and we need to allow elderly people to receive care at their homes rather than have them go to a care home. Solutions at the crossroads of technology, public health & care and social sciences can help to cope with two major problems associated with home care: (1) fighting social isolation and (2) answering needs for assistance and safety. The ongoing COVID-19 crisis has dramatically demonstrated the need for better care solutions for older citizens. The goal of this project is to develop a home care solution to assist elderly persons who wish to stay in their own homes and allowing to coordinate the action of all actors in their personal social network (social helpers, caregivers, parents, neighbours, etc.). We follow an interdisciplinary approach with specialists of social science (UCLouvain), software development and integration (Electronic Design International), smart environments (UCLouvain) and security (Sirris). The project will feature testing deployments in collaboration with home care organisations ASD, the federation of the nine centres for home care in Brussels and Wallonia, and VPPLUS the Flemish cooperation of 4,000 home care workers in Flanders and Wallonia. 

Objective

The developed solution will be particularly respectful in sharing and security of the elderly’s personal and sensitive data. It includes: 

• Sociological study of the perception (social acceptability) and potential for uptake of the results, involving all stakeholders. 
• Considering the recent health crisis and the debates around the sharing of personal health tracking data, creating innovative and safe elderly care solutions. 
• Developing the proof of concept and final commercial prototype that can be deployed at the test site (e.g., an elderly home)

Approach

Stakeholders can expect: 

• The results of sociological study of the perception and social acceptability of the innovative technology. 
• The reference smart home hub architecture considering privacy, security, social interaction, health, and well-being of the elderly. 
• The privacy-preserving and security solutions for the smart home hub
• Smart home system minimal viable product

Target group

Home care centres/organizations, companies offering care home services and healthcare institutions (e.g., clinics or hospitals).

Reference

Innoviris 2020-RDIR-50c

Project partners

• Sirris
• UCLouvain
• EDI