Lotus Eldercare Technologies is partnering a Singaporean Research Institution to develop a home system to enhance safety and detect falls at home for the older persons.
Here is a short story on the possibilities:
Imagine…
a day in 2065, the year of celebration of SG100. Nursing home will be a thing in the history books and all people young or old, with or without disabilities will be supported in their smart homes with remote monitors and home based service at a vocal command or a hand gesture away. With a Lotus ElderSafe system installed, no older persons will be falling because of poor lighting at night, help is available with just a vocal command away and instant communications with love ones can be achieve via 2 way intercom services.
There will be in built ambience monitors to detect activity levels and to warn on possible falls. There are in-bed monitors to monitor heart rate, breathing rate and abnormal respiratory sounds such as wheeze or crepitation. Infra red camera installed into the system to monitor body temperatures and sound recognition technologies to recognize number of toilet flushes in the night and number of wakening during sleep time.
Data of vitals monitoring via Bluetooth enabled equipment enters into cloud systems like Healthvault, together with Lotus ElderMemories Systems record both the usual vital signs and the all the health and medical record the doctors and health professions had been putting in. Doctors in clinics and hospitals will know the whole story with all the data presented in a clear manner and patients need not repeat their conditions and allergies over and over again.
As a smart health monitoring system, warnings and potential medical issues can be flagged out earlier, for example, postural hypotension with a new medications or a few bouts of diarrhoea with dehydration acuminating to syncope and fall etc.
Elders and their care givers can easily get services and support from day to day activities and health services with a central case coordinator unit such a CHOICE model. All the vitals data and health records and remote monitoring and warning systems will be inclusive in these smart homes in Singapore Year 2065. That will be the time when institutionalising frail elderly will another page in the history books and all can have Aging in Place in their own comfortable and familiar homes.