“Caring for aging adults, especially those dealing with progressive Alzheimer’s and dementia, can place a high burden on family caregivers who cannot be with their care recipients 24/7,” said Sajay Arthanat, professor of occupational therapy. “The ultimate goal of this research is to help support those caregivers while keeping their family member healthy and active at home.”

The interdisciplinary team of researchers created a prototype robot that has been tested in a controlled lab setting. The new grant from the NIH’s National Institute on Aging will help build on their work by creating a technological framework to develop social assistive robots with more capabilities, and test them in home settings. 

This would include compatibility with commercial devices already found in homes, such as motion-control cameras and sensors, to keep older adults safe and on track with their healthcare needs. If a patient does not take their medication on time, for example, a sensor strategically placed by their pill bottle would track the lack of movement –indicating the patient didn’t take their medicine – and would alert the assistive robot. The robot would then trigger a vocal reminder to the patient. If, after a few attempts, the patient does not respond by taking their medicine, the robot would alert a remote human caregiver who would be able to intervene.

“With this grant, we’ll be able to further develop the robot’s technological framework from not only using smart home devices but also artificial intelligence and wearables, like a smart watch, to help gauge the patient’s activity level, health management, and connectedness with caregivers,” said Momotaz Begum, assistant professor of computer science.

While this research is focused on robots to aid with Alzheimer’s and dementia care, researchers hope it may have other future applications and benefit elderly people by letting them age safely in their homes.