Having worked in tech for 20 years, I noticed that the industry doesn’t think a lot about technology for seniors. They tend to forget that older people exist and that they are people with real needs.
The design of new technologies often overlooks the elder population. Digital natives, the generation born into technology, design most tech these days. These people have different experiences and perceptions than digital immigrants, the generation who adopted technology at a later point in life.
But if you’ve been paying attention, you’ve noticed that older people have used technology extensively during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many digital immigrants adapted quickly to technology. This allowed them to socialize and connect with others during a period where they would otherwise have been isolated. This shows that seniors have the ability to use technology, and increase the interest and drive to do so!
Opportunities for a better quality of life
Technology for seniors provides an ocean of opportunities as adoption is growing rapidly in the older population. 19% of the US population will be over 65 by 2030 and will control over 50% of individual net worth.
Tech solutions have a huge potential to help older people live healthier and more independent lives. More specifically, people living with Alzheimer’s and dementia also stand to benefit from technology. Emerging tech presents new ways to address their unique needs.
Individuals living with dementia are more likely to forget taking medication, or become disoriented, unbalanced, or lost. Moreover, they may have difficulty interacting socially, and enjoying activities that require short-term memory.
Tackling these needs with tech can help the person be independent. It can also reduce the time their care partners spend helping them manage basic tasks. Most of the US has a critical long-term gap in staffing for home health and care facility personnel. Increasingly, this gap is being filled by unpaid caregivers such as family members. We desperately need technology that helps people living with dementia be safer and happier while removing time burdens from care partners
There are two main areas where new and innovative technology for seniors stand to benefit people living with dementia and their care partners:
- Health and safety technologies automatically monitor individuals and identify problems proactively
- Personalization and engagement technologies provide innovative entertainment and connection opportunities to those living with dementia
Both types of technologies can reduce the effort and stress care partners undergo while keeping individuals living with dementia safe and engaged.
Software is becoming more capable of personalization, meeting people with dementia where they are by providing not just safety, but also engagement and happiness.
Monitoring seniors’ health and safety
Technology for seniors overall has come a long way since “I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up.” Senior alert tech was stagnant for many years and required conscious user interaction. But not anymore.
Current safety technology for seniors is now sensor-based and connected to the cloud. Emerging technology looks at the “big picture”, and analyzes patterns and behavior around the entire home to proactively understand if a safety issue is developing. These can also save significant time, ensuring residents are safe without a physical visit.
Certain devices can also help to monitor adherence to medication, which can be a challenge for individuals with progressive memory loss. Loading and setting up some of the devices can also be time-consuming and prone to errors.
Tracking and monitoring biometric data can also be done with certain devices. These allow problems to be identified more proactively. These are helpful especially for people living with dementia, who might otherwise not recognize physical changes. However, these require consistent compliance.
Wearable health tracking technologies provide great flexibility and make tracking accessible to most people living with dementia. However, these may require a lot of effort from the care partner to manage. For example, simply keeping devices can be a chore.
How health monitoring tech might evolve
Overall, when it comes to health and safety monitoring technology for seniors, accuracy can be a problem, especially for non-personalized mass-market devices. False positives can cause extra stress and wasted efforts by care partners.
Looking ahead, artificial intelligence is paving the way for the next wave of monitoring, utilizing wearable technology that tracks health data and learns from people’s movements. This tech can help predict fall risks, as well as other problems before they occur.
Safety monitoring has evolved rapidly and will likely be a cornerstone technology in the near future. Health tracking will likely be pushed more in the future with its increasing adoption by medical providers and payers.
Both have the promise of increasing autonomy for people living with dementia. Still, they can drain time from care partners if not properly personalized. Ultimately, as the technology evolves, it should make people safer while reducing the time and frequency care partners need to spend monitoring.
Increasing engagement through personalized technology
My family is no stranger to the complexities of dementia care. My Dad struggled to provide my Mom with constant interaction to keep her occupied and happy each day after her early onset dementia diagnosis. One of the few activities that worked was driving her around for hours each day on back roads. This soothed her, and kept her mind occupied.
Beyond her day-to-day health and safety needs, my mom found pleasure in these kinds of interactions, and in a way, I believe these also gave her strength and kept her going. However, doing this every day wore my dad down. So many of the activities my mom once enjoyed on her own were not accessible to her when her short-term memory faltered, and he (like many care partners) was left to fill the entire gap.
Thinking once again about how technology can address the medical aspect of dementia care, what if we could have solutions that address the person-centric aspect of it? What if, back then, existing tech also helped him to address this part of mom’s needs?
Tackling boredom, loneliness, and lack of purpose
People living with dementia have limited activities that can be safely and effectively enjoyed. Boredom, loneliness, and a lack of purpose can be devastating for an individual’s wellbeing. Moreover, addressing this takes lots of time from already overstretched care partners.
Thankfully, new technology promises to bring more opportunities for them to connect to others and enjoy activities with more autonomy.
The “first wave” of technology for seniors has focused on simplicity of use and navigation.
Adoption and reception for these solutions, however, have been mixed.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the broader tech world has come into play. Software solutions, such as video conferencing, have been widely adopted to simplify daily tasks.
Voice-activated tech solutions are also evolving and becoming more affordable. Versions specific to dementia care, however, have been launched with mixed feedback. How far a non-visual and no-touch solution can go for dementia remains to be seen.
Robotics can also provide interaction and emotional support, and simulate companionship. A number of applications are currently in use and can be especially effective for people at later stages of dementia.
Moving into the future with AI-powered and personalized technology
Integrating AI and machine learning into dementia assistive technology products can help paint a clearer picture of an individual’s needs. People living with dementia change over time, and activities they love become increasingly difficult. An activity that was once enjoyable and properly challenging can become frustrating and overly challenging if not adapted to meet the needs of the individual.
This can apply even to something as simple as TV shows and movies. As more tech companies are learning the benefits of personalization, we are seeing a world where movies and videos are welcoming and accessible to people with short-term memory loss. The key is removing assumptions of uniform capabilities.
Personalized technology and music can also go hand in hand to generate joy and mental stimulation for people living with dementia– even those who are in the final stages of the disease.
Selecting specific music that was important in a person’s life will have by far the most impact.
New technologies can be used to match an individual to genres, eras, and even individual songs that are still part of their deepest self.
New AI and linking technology can also provide opportunities for volunteerism and community-building. Everyone needs to have meaning in their life and have the opportunity to feel helpful to others. People living with dementia can be matched and connected with those who have similar interests. This facilitates immersive interaction in welcoming environments.
It can also give them assurance that they still have the ability to help others and remain productive in spite of their condition. Studies show that connected people with purpose are happier, healthier, and more autonomous.
Preparing for the next generation
Past technology for engagement often required expensive specialized devices. Today, options are evolving, and costs are lowering as off-the-shelf hardware is becoming more applicable for people living with dementia. Software is becoming more capable of personalization, meeting people with dementia where they are by providing not just safety, but also engagement and happiness. And software solutions hosted in the cloud can easily follow people as they transition to different care settings.
Care partners also stand to benefit greatly. Engagement technology can provide them with respite and reduce the time they spend on repetitive tasks.
Using person-directed technology is the future of dementia care. The next wave of people living with dementia will be savvier with technology. They will also expect more sophisticated and well-designed solutions. It is imperative that technology for seniors focuses on their individual needs, and not an idea of what the average user might be.
Our market is too big and too important. There are simply too many problems, too few care partners, and too much money wasted to not create solutions. Ultimately, using and developing person-directed technology is needed to better serve persons living with Alzheimer’s and dementia, care partners, and the care community.