Perhaps you are currently faced with the question of whether you want to move into a new, age-appropriate home or convert your beloved four walls barrier-free. But what happens if you or your partner need care? Under what conditions could technological developments support everyday life at home in a sensible and discreet way?
The number of people in need of care in Germany is increasing rapidly. Unfortunately, however, many elderly people are not lucky enough to be cared for by their own relatives. And the nursing staff is also becoming scarce. The idea of placing the welfare of the elderly and infirm in the hands of robots comes from Japan. But can we still talk about their “well-being” at all – and emotionally?
Almost 2.9 million elderly people in need of care currently live in Germany, one third of them in retirement homes. The Federal Statistical Office estimates that this figure will increase to around 4.5 million by 2050. How should this challenge of demographic change be met? In the future we will face the problem that although there are more and more people in need of care, there are fewer and fewer people who take up and pursue care professions. In addition, the health and nursing insurance companies lack money, but this becomes necessary when the number of seniors who are no longer able to cope with their daily lives themselves increases.
Are nursing staff being replaced by technology?
The Japanese are facing a similarly precarious situation, which also leads to new ideas in the field of artificial intelligence in the country of technical innovations in the field of geriatric care. Already 16 years ago, the electronics group Panasonic opened a high-tech nursing home near Osaka, where residents were supplied and controlled exclusively by technology. However, even the technology-oriented Japanese could not make friends with some products such as necklaces with motion sensors, which were intended to monitor the stay of the home residents and prevent them from running away.
Germans are much more sceptical about the idea of being washed, fed and carried by robots in their old age. For this reason alone, it cannot be assumed that artificial intelligence can replace human nursing staff in Germany in the near future. Some media often suggest that the technology will make all nursing staff obsolete in the future. “But there is a translation error here”, Christian Buhtz, founder of robotics manufacturer Boston Dynamics Marc Raibert, clarifies in an interview with heise online. “There are simply no care robots. There are only robotic systems that can support individual functions and thus relieve the workload of nursing staff”.
What counts is the interpersonal aspect
According to Buhtz, the problem is not the technical feasibility, but the complexity of interpersonal relationships between nurse and patient, which enables individual encounters. The question of whether nursing robots can really satisfy the needs of old people does not really arise from this point of view. Artificial intelligence has no feelings like love, connectedness or joy, it can only simulate such feelings corresponding behaviour. And even if the opponent may not recognize the difference, one moves here ethically seen on a narrow degree.
Christian Buhtz advocates a sober presentation of the real capabilities and possibilities of machines and prefers the terms “robotic care assistance systems” or “robots for maintaining autonomy”. In Germany, numerous companies are working to support people in need of care in their daily lives in this way. Primarily it concerns technology, which is installed into the dwelling, in order to relieve caregivers or maintaining member. Technological developments such as automatic roller shutter control, intelligent overflow systems for the bathtub, fall detectors and smoke detectors networked with emergency call centres are already available on the market, but are not yet very widespread in private homes due to the high purchase costs.
Together with the Berlin Charité, the industrial gas company LINDE is working on a project called Bea@home, which is intended to enable respiratory care for people in need of the most severe care at home. The implementation is currently being tested in practice – with great success: the project gives the caregivers greater confidence in taking action and patients can be cared for in their home environment. Instead of all-round care by a nurse, a sophisticated monitoring system is installed at the bedside of the respiratory patients and continuously transmits the medical values to a hospital. For the nursing and health insurance companies this means a considerable financial relief, and for the patients and their relatives nothing less than that they can live side by side in their own four walls.
In a discreet supporting function, Artificial Intelligence can actually help elderly people. But a warming smile and the right word at the right time can only give a being with emotional intelligence.
You want to design your home with modern care technologies to suit your age? We will be happy to check whether your property is suitable for this.
Foto: © aerogondo