MK360, immersive technology for the care and welfare of older people

Publications Bank of innovations

MK360, immersive technology for the care and welfare of older people

Broomx and Grup Arrels

Users of the Grup Arrels enjoying an immersive experience. Retrieved from Broomx’s website.

Projector that allows immersive group experiences of 360 degrees to the range of services, residences, and open centres for older people to perform cognitive, physical, sensorial, and emotional stimulation activities with great therapeutic power.

Thanks to the collaboration between the Catalan company Broomx and the Foundation Grup Arrels, they have fostered diverse experiences of application of immersive technology MK360 in old users of different services: treatment of people with cognitive disorders, dementia and Alzheimer’s; the creation of relaxing spaces where music and images surround the users; funny and energizing experiences, such as the projection of a roller coaster tour; or the recreation of city sites in an immersive way, an experience that has been especially useful during the months of residential confinement due to Covid-19.

The 360-degree images that the Grup Arrels projected through the projectors MK360 of Broomx were recorded by the group’s own socio-sanitary professionals, using their mobile phones, in community and neighbourhood spaces (parks, markets, streets, etc.) in the city of Barcelona.

Broomx

Easy Reading, making webpages accessible to people with cognitive disabilities

Publications Bank of innovations

Easy Reading, making webpages accessible to people with cognitive disabilities

Athena, Dart, FunkaNu, JKU, KI-I, PIKSL, Texthelp, TUD, W3C

Test of the Easy Reading software. Retrieved from the Easy Reading website

Software for Internet users with cognitive disabilities that offers a wide tool package to make it easy to read and understand any existing web page. It can be installed on the computer of those people who need it, and Easy Reading is responsible for adapting the content of web pages in the way most useful way for the user: making the structure simpler; changing the colours and design; explaining the content with symbols, videos or images; defining the words that the text includes; passing the text to a voice; etc. The software offers all these functions semi-automatically, as they require a certain interaction with the user.

To develop the project, “peer research” has been used to take into account the real needs of users, involving those who will use the end product, in this case people with cognitive disabilities. These are the main target group of Easy Reading, but not the only one, as it can also benefit old people with cognitive disabilities or other people with cognitive difficulties.

Easy Reading

Helpper, people with support needs connect with people willing to help them

Publications Bank of innovations

Helpper, people with support needs connect with people willing to help them

Helpper

Young helpper helping an elderly woman to do groceries. Retrieved from Helpper’s website.

Service that connects people who need some support for their daily life tasks (helppies), with people close to them, in the same neighbourhood or village, who are willing to help them (helppers).

Helppper is a model that seeks the comfort of both sides, because it allows helppers to specify what their availability is (schedule, types of service they can offer, if they offer it free or with remuneration, etc.); and the helppies to select the support to be received (what person, for which support needs, schedule, modality, price, etc.). Helpper offers three subscription modalities: Basic, Standard and Premium, to make it easier for each person to personify the level of assistance they want to receive.

People with disabilities, with chronic diseases, elderly people, parents and mothers who are very busy, and even carers who need help in caring for dependents, can access the service.

The types of assistance or possible tasks to offer/receive include: small home repairs; food aid; support with administrative processes; travel and transport support; company to mitigate unwanted loneliness; babysitting; etc.

The service is available in French and Dutch.

Helpper

Virtual visits to social services to bring them closer to citizenship

Publications Bank of innovations

Virtual visits to social services to bring them closer to citizenship

Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council

Example of a virtual visit. Retrieved from Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council website.

Service that allows virtual visits to the different social services offered by the City Council of Vitoria-Gasteiz. It is a combination of Google Street View and YouTube 360 technologies to be able to offer an immersive and real experience without moving from home. This technology enables the realization of interactive visits, while at the same time providing summary videos of the sites through the local social services website.

Visits are tours that serve to make the services and their facilities known, using them agilely and easily, either through the interaction with the computer’s mouse, touch-like to mobile devices, or even with virtual reality glasses. Spaces can be visited virtually at any time, and thanks to the 360 degrees’ video format the feel is similar to being present in the visited site.

This information instrument seeks, not only to connect social services with citizenship, but also to other institutions, third sector entities, etc. to promote networking and cooperation between services.

Ayuntamiento de Vitoria-Gasteiz

InvisiCare, monitoring without sensors of the homes of the elderly

Publications Bank of innovations

InvisiCare, monitoring without sensors of the homes of the elderly

JDC-Eshel

Old woman accompanied by her granddaughter. Retrieved from InvisiCare’s website.

A proactive, preventive and community technology system to support older people and their families in a non-invasive, secure, autonomous and community-integrated way. Use the collected encrypted data to detect unexpected patterns or behaviours that require family, social or health intervention. And through artificial intelligence, it warns whoever is relevant. This will help to prevent situations that may pose a long-term problem. In addition to this preventative aspect, it also has a proactive one, since through an App and through a network of communities and accompaniment it provides active and permanent support to the elderly, from the family, the community and public social and health services.

The InvisiCare technology is not invasive as it does not use appliances, does not need contact with people, nor does it need any installation or house maintenance, so it does not face any kind of technological barrier by users. It works thanks to these pillars: the obtaining of data, which is securely and encrypted, by telecommunications and supply operators (TV, telephone, light, water, etc.); the detection of triggers, since it uses the data collected with algorithms to detect abnormal situations that require attention; the generation of notifications, by means of artificial intelligence that decides the type of notification to be sent; and at the same time advises on the type of accompanying and support that needs to be put in place and, if this is a prolonged action, the system will create a roadmap to carry out.

Invisicare

3D Community, social housing built with 3D printers

Publications Bank of innovations

3D Community, social housing built with 3D printers

New Story, ICON, Échale

Two kids in front of one of the houses built in Mexico. Retrieved from New Story’s website.

3D-built housing, which enables high-quality housing parks to be generated and in a much faster and more affordable way than with traditional construction options.

The first housing park with this technology has been built in Tabasco, Mexico, and consists of 50 houses. The houses are made with the collaboration of ICON, a construction technology company. Thanks to its 3D Vulcan printer, which uses a cement mix called Lavacrete, it can build secure and durable constructions with very little time, as 3D printers can work uninterruptedly for 24 hours, until completion of construction. End touches, such as roofs or windows, are added in the traditional way, employing local builders.

Families living in these early Mexican dwellings previously participated in the process of designing their home, bringing their vision of their own needs and what they thought important to have at home. These families were selected through interviews and surveys in the area, to identify those with the greatest need. The houses have a social mortgage of about 400 pesos per month, a mortgage that does not return to New Story, the sponsoring organization, but rather to a Community fund from which families will be able to dispose in the future to invest in this community. In this way, it not only innovates in the way it is built, but also creates a community of owners that empowers the people who are part of it.

New Story

OKencasa, support for non-professional carers

Publications Bank of innovations

OKencasa, support for non-professional carers

OKencasa

Woman taking care of a dependent elderly man. Retrieved from OKencasa website.

Platform for the support aimed at non-professional carers caring a relative dependent at home. Through the Zaindoo app it offers permanent accompaniment from a care specialist, online training, tools for organizing care tasks, and discounts or advantages in services of physiotherapy, legal advice, home adaptation, etc. The aim is to improve the quality of life of the carers and to make their job easier, that is to say to look after the carers.

OKencasa periodically evaluates the physical, emotional and psychological well-being of the care-givers and, accordingly, offers them a personal plan of improvement and support that can be readjusted in time. The professionals in the service ensure that the caregiver is always accompanied and listened to with regard to the burden of their care tasks.

OKencasa also provides information to public social services so that they can provide better support for families and provide more efficient socio-sanitary care. The application is currently available in Euskera and Spanish.

OKencasa

Positive Sparks, platform to give voice to isolated or excluded young people

Publications Bank of innovations

Positive Sparks, platform to give voice to isolated or excluded young people

The Bytes Project

Youngsters participating in a face-to-face workshop from the project. Retrieved from Bytes’ website.

Youth participation platform which helps to give a voice to young people who are more isolated or excluded, to express their concerns, needs and opinion on the services offered by the community. The platform uses “Machine Learning” to analyse and interpret young people’s responses in a fast and automatic way.

In addition to empowering the most excluded young people and facilitating their participation, Positive Sparks allows social services and organisations working with young people with difficulties (mental health, drug abuse, school drop-out, etc.) to detect deficiencies in services, improve their interventions and identify new needs requiring new responses or services. The platform also offers the Public Administrations to use Positive Sparks for the development of youth-related public policies.

Within this initiative, more specific projects have emerged, such as Rural Sparks, which helps to give a voice to young people with difficulties in rural areas. On the other hand, Positive Sparks is not only a virtual platform, but also organizes workshops and presence activities to better meet young participants and to interact with them at first hand. Workshops are imparted by the Bytes organization in collaboration with other organizations, teaching centres, etc. It is currently a tool only available in English.

The Bytes Project

DigiContact, remote and immediate social care service available 24h

Publications Bank of innovations

DigiContact, remote and immediate social care service available 24h

DigiContact

DigiContact worker attending a client. Retrieved from the DigiContact website

Remote and immediate 24h care service for people with long-term care needs: disabled people, elderly people with dependency, people with mental health problems or addictions, etc. The service allows extra respite and support to these people’s non-professional carers, avoiding their saturation, and also offers them support if needed. Users can enrol in the service either individually or through social entities. The service adapts to the needs of each user (for example, calling to remind him of a medication, wake him up in the morning, etc.) according to what is established at the time of contracting the service; and, depending on the needs of the person, DigiContact complements online care with presence visits.

DigiContact works through an app that is very easy to use: only by pressing a button it does the call (with image) to be able to receive remote support and attention. The camera is located in the middle of the screen, making it easier to have a sense of proximity and making it possible for professionals to read the verbal and nonverbal signals of the user.

Professionals working in DigiContact (psychologists, nurses, social workers…) have a specialized training to meet all kinds of needs users can have online.

The DigiContact service has proved especially useful during the lockdown times of the Covid-19 pandemic. It is currently a service only available in Dutch.

DigiContact

Hero Arm, an affordable bionic arm made with 3D Printing

Publications Bank of innovations

Hero Arm, an affordable bionic arm made with 3D Printing

Open Bionics

Cameron Millar with his Hero Arm inspired in Star Wars. Retrieved from Open Bionics

The most functional and affordable prosthetic arm in the market today, as it is made with 3D printing. It is designed for both adults and children with amputations below the elbow. Hero Arm is a myoelectric prosthesis that uses the muscle cues of the rest of the arm to function and have the grip function.

One of its particularities is its uniqueness, as it is designed according to the exact measurements of the person carrying it, making it very easily adaptable to each person and that each prosthesis is unique. This is possible thanks to 3D technology, which allows first to make a scanner of the limb to obtain the exact measurements of the person, and then to use 3D printing to print the prosthetic. This reduces production costs, while at the same time increasing speed, and it becomes possible to make a prosthetic arm in just one day.

Hero Arm is a robust but lightweight prosthesis, as well as comfortable and breathable, making it easier to adapt and at the same time remove it for cleaning, charging, etc. It is designed to be as intuitive as possible for the person thanks to vibrations, lights, buttons and sensors. In addition to being the most affordable prosthetic of this type in the market, it also has a number of different covers to choose from. This way each person can choose the model that is closest to their style, from simple designs to bionic arms inspired by Iron Man, making this prosthesis an empowering and functional element, especially for children.

Open Bionics