European project into Assisted Living for elderly people
A new project focusing on assisted living has just kick-started with the goal of enabling elderly people to continue living a self-determined life in their own homes using modern information technology. The three year EU-funded Emergency Monitoring and Prevention (EMERGE) project will aim to develop ambient technology to recognise emergency situations in the home and provide assistance to people faced with difficult situations. The Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE) will be leading the €2.45 million project, working with eight other European research institutes and industrial partners. The applied research institute will deploy the knowledge it has gained from designing its famous Assisted Living Laboratory in EMERGE. The Laboratory, dubbed 'The Intelligent Apartment', is a high tech living environment equipped with sophisticated sensors and electronic data processors. It recognises when a person has suffered an accident and reacts proactively to the situation by alerting the 'Emergency Medical Dispatch Office', for example. The project will also use the lab as a realistic test environment to test and integrate its prototype solutions. In addition, field tests are planned in nursing homes and assisted living institutions in Germany and Greece in order to collect practical experience. Finally, the project hopes to avert dangers and relieve people from routine tasks while they continue to live in their preferred home environment. It should also lead to cost savings for individual patients and the health sector in general.
Countries
Germany