Objective IWARD targets mainly hospitals and healthcare centres to overcome the shortages of healthcare staff - a major issue in European healthcare. Our aging society and economic pressure increase the patients-to-medics' ratio, having an adverse effect on healthcare quality and performance. Not being able to attend all patients at the right time and not keeping the hospitals clean enough (e.g. MRSA Transmission) also increases recovery time and cost.To improve the quality of healthcare, these focal issues emerge: fast identification and location of patients needing immediate attention; reduction of human errors; effective cleaning in hospitals; wider reach of specialist medics, possibly attending patients remotely. To achieve this, IWARD presents a robot swarm delivering support to oversee activities in healthcare environments, providing a multipurpose, cost-effective and scalable solution to enhance quality of healthcare.Four major tasks are: attendance, recognition, communication and support (assisting/cleaning). Attendance means to monitor hospital wards by robots acting as a dynamic swarm. Recognition points out, that the swarm is able to recognize patients or objects needing attention, providing immediate information about the location and needs of the concerned patients. The robots can be equipped with different adaptable hardware components for floor cleaning and delivery of food, linen, medicine etc. All mobile robots are capable of providing patients and visitors with guidance and information. It provides easy to use but high tech interaction interfaces like voice control through mobile and fix-mounted robots.The swarm based approach unburdens the nursing staff from the details of robot control and central coordination - reducing the complexity of robot control to that of a chat, having the swarm negotiating which robot to use for each job, shortening the reaction time, reducing human error and increasing efficiency to deliver better patient care. Fields of science medical and health scienceshealth sciencesnursingengineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringroboticsswarm robotics Programme(s) FP6-IST - Information Society Technologies: thematic priority under the specific programme "Integrating and strengthening the European research area" (2002-2006). Topic(s) IST-2005-2.6.1 - Advanced Robotics Call for proposal Data not available Funding Scheme STREP - Specific Targeted Research Project Coordinator FRAUNHOFER IAF EU contribution No data Address Tullastr. 72 79108 MÜNCHEN Germany See on map Links Website Opens in new window Total cost No data Participants (10) Sort alphabetically Sort by EU Contribution Expand all Collapse all ASSOCIATION POUR LA RECHERCHE ET LE DEVELOPPEMENT DES METHODES ET PROCESSUS INDUSTRIELS France EU contribution No data Address BOULEVARD SAINT-MICHEL 60 75272 PARIS 6 See on map Total cost No data CARDIFF UNIVERSITY United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address 30 - 36 NEWPORT ROAD CF24 0DE CARDIFF See on map Total cost No data DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY Ireland EU contribution No data Address GLASNEVIN, DUBLIN 9 See on map Total cost No data ECOLE NATIONALE SUPERIEURE DES MINES DE SAINT-ETIENNE France EU contribution No data Address COURS FAURIEL 158 42023 SAINT ETIENNE CEDEX See on map Total cost No data FUNDACION FATRONIK Spain EU contribution No data Address PA MIKELETEGI 7 20009 DONOSTIA SS See on map Total cost No data FUNDACION INSTITUTO GERONTOLOGICO MATIA - INGEMA Spain EU contribution No data Address CALLE USANDIZAGA 6 SAN SEBASTIAN See on map Links Website Opens in new window Total cost No data SAKARYA UNIVERSITESI Türkiye EU contribution No data Address ESENTEPE KAMPUSU 54187 SAKARYA See on map Total cost No data THE UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address 6 KENSINGTON TERRACE NE1 7RU NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE See on map Total cost No data THE UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address UNIVERSITY HOUSE, KIRBY CORNER ROAD CV4 8UW COVENTRY See on map Total cost No data UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI NAPOLI FEDERICO II Italy EU contribution No data Address CORSO UMBERTO 1 80138 NAPOLI See on map Total cost No data