Vincles BCN, service to strengthen social ties of the lonesome elderly

admin on 21 December 2018

Foto: Ajuntament de Barcelona

In Barcelona, more than 300.000 people aged 65 or older live alone, of which 100.000 are over 80. Vincles BCN is a social innovation project that wants to strengthen the social relationships of older people who feel lonely and improve their well-being through new technologies.

The project has the following main objectives:

Reduce the feeling of loneliness of the elderly,
Maintain and strengthen existing social relationships,
Expand the social relationships of people and create new spaces for the relationship,
Use of IT (Information Technologies) as a communication tool to relate to their environment their environment.

The service uses an app installed on a tablet as a communication tool, which will serve to put people in contact and strengthen their relationships, while creating new ones. Online communication is promoted through the app, while face-to-face meetings are organized. The app allows the user to communicate with his/her family and friends, and with the people who form app-specific user groups.

Characteristics of innovation

Aging, Bank of innovations, Independent living, Lab, Link with the community, New service, New technological tool, Personalization of the service, Prediction and prevention, Right of choice of the user, Self-management and participation, User empowerment

Location

Barcelona

Partners / Funders

Bloomberg Philanthropies

Genesis

The project participated in the Mayors Challenge 2014 (the challenge of the mayors) of Bloomberg Philanthropies, along with 155 more cities, of which 16 were finalists and 5 won. This Barcelona project received the first prize, worth 5 million euros. After a first pilot phase, the project has spread throughout the city as a new service of the Area of Social Rights of the City Council of Barcelona.

Implementation level

The project began in January 2017 in five districts of Barcelona. Since March 2018 the service has been deployed throughout the city of Barcelona and any citizen can already request the service. In May 2018 the service had 600 users active and wanted to reach 1000 users by the end of the same year.

Further information

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ELDCARE, prevention of loneliness and the social and health risks associated with aging

admin on 12 November 2018

Personalized reminder tool for people living alone who need support to improve their independence

Eldcare is a personalized reminder tool equipped with a screen and a speaker, developed for people living alone in their homes and need support to improve their autonomy. It is a smart device developed and enhanced by ABD, an innovative technological tool to prevent unwanted loneliness and the social and health risks associated with aging.

The device offers personalized daily reminders in audiovisual format, with the aim of improving safety, preventing accidents at home, reducing the feeling of loneliness in the elderly and improving digital literacy. Without Wi-Fi, Eldcare launches short videos recorded by professionals and / or people close to the user, such as: “remember you have an appointment with your doctor today at 10 a.m.” or “remember to turn off heating before going to bed ”or“ remember to drink water and use the walker’s help at home ”, or the steps to follow to use your smartphone and make a video call.

This tool is not invasive or intrusive with the privacy of people and is very intuitive to use, respecting the preferences and needs of older people, because they always agree with them the type of message and the time when videos are playing. Also, it doesn’t play a random robot voice, but the image and voice of someone they know and trust.

Therefore, it is a person-centered care solution, based and developed on the verbal needs of the person, following the path to e-health and integrating new avenues of collaboration between social and health services. , preventing risky situations that could have a major social and economic impact in the field of health and social services.

Due to the pandemic of COVID-19, in which the digital divide has become even more visible, the use of Eldcare has been rethought, bringing it to the homes of people with a very low level of digital literacy in order to accompany them in the learning process about using their smartphone from a distance.