LIFEBOTS Exchange - creating a new reality of care and welfare through the inclusion of social robots.

Project Information

LIFEBOTS Exchange

Grant agreement ID: 824047

DOI

10.3030/824047

Project closed

EC signature date 26 October 2018

Start date 1 April 2019

End date 31 January 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Total cost

€ 768 200,00

EU contribution

€ 740 600,00

Coordinated by

NORGES TEKNISK-NATURVITENSKAPELIGE UNIVERSITET NTNU
Norway

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - LIFEBOTS Exchange (LIFEBOTS Exchange - creating a new reality of care and welfare through the inclusion of social robots.)

Reporting period: 2024-01-01 to 2025-01-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The project aims at enhancing cross-sector, international and interdisciplinary collaboration in the area of social robotics technology for care. Are robots ready for society, and is society ready for robots? How can social robots can be included in people's lives? Robots are increasingly being used in the healthcare sector as a potential solution to the current and future challenges faced by the healthcare sector. Due to the global population ageing, by 2035 the world is projected to lack 12.9 million healthcare professionals (WHO: 2013). Social robots may benefit the quality life and wellbeing of patients, their families and healthcare professionals. Evidence and much of the needed knowledge are still lacking. Strong interdisciplinarity and cross-sectorial research and innovation activity is needed. A knowledge hub for social robotics will be created with a threefold aim: (1) To enhance the competencies of involved staff members, refining and focusing their skills; (2) To build a tri-sectoral network involving academia, industry and users of technology, and (3) to create an enduring network that will outlive the grant funding. The core of the project includes some of the strongest actors in international research, SMEs and user organisations, focusing on three activity lines: technological, sociological, care-and-welfare. To be able to understand the impact of introducing social robots in care, the three areas that will be affected by this technical evolution will be researched: (1) care provided as medical practice; this is the care given to patients in hospitals, clinics, rehabilitation centres and other medical facilities. (2) residential care - this area refers to all care institutions accepting patient/clients as residents: elderly homes, nursing homes, special needs schools for children or adults, etc. (3) family care, investigating how social robots can be implemented in the home, and as a part of domestic life.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the project was suspended, meaning without secondments, from the 7. March 2020 to 30. April 2022. The project was then suspended for 26 months. Due to this period of inactivity in secondments, the project was extended from the original end date on 31. March 2023, to the new end date on 31. January 2025, giving the project a period of 44 working months. After the restart of the project in May 2022, a total of 36 completed secondments were executed. This gives a total of 42 completed secondments from the start of the project.

The Consortium organized 2 workshops during the reporting period, one hosted by the partner EHTEL in Belgium and another in a co-organization of NTNU, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, and Co-Robotics in Italy.
Several project partners participated in various events and disseminated the project. These included: Robotics4EU Co-creation workshop in healthcare, Oslo 6.6.2023 with the participation of partners NTNU and IDMind. Presentation at Reykjavik University in Iceland by the partner TUKE.

Multiple papers were published including:
"Exoskeletons for all: The interplay between exoskeletons, inclusion, gender, and intersectionality", Roger A. Søraa and Eduard Fosch-Villaronga, Paladyn, Journal of Behavioral Robotics
"Children's perspectives of social robots: A study of the robots Pepper, AV1 and Tessa at Norwegian research fairs", Roger A. Søraa, Pernille S. Nyvoll, Karoline Grønvik, and J. Artur Serrano, AI & Society
"The Rehapiano—Detecting, Measuring, and Analyzing Action Tremor Using Strain Gauges", Ferenčík N, Jaščur M, Bundzel M, Cavallo F., Sensors. 2020; 20(3):663. https://doi.org/10.3390/s20030663

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The LIFEBOTS Exchange project has explored the potential applications of the technologies the partners have expertize in. Namely, the use of AI in several aspects of Human-Robot Interaction; the applications to healthcare and specifically stroke rehabilitation with a robotic hand exerciser; the integration of facieal expression recognition for the study of emotions in persons with cognitive impairment, etc.
The Consortium is also focusing in policy and strategy definition in both research directions and organizational change due to digitalization processes with focus on social robotic related issues.

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