Robots caring for the elderly

Pearl the personal-assistant robot walks, talks and even blinks her eyes. She has ears, eyebrows and even lips of a kind on her mobile “face.”

To an infirm person living alone, this high-tech metal device that can dispense advice and even guide movements around the house is a substitute for an increasingly rare — and expensive — flesh-and-bones home health care worker.

By providing visual and auditory reminders on when to take medicine or even go to the bathroom, Pearl can help a fragile senior maintain his or her independence outside an assisted living facility. The robot has a laser range finder and special navigational software to allow it to move and even create a map of its surroundings on a video screen in its “belly.”

The prototype costs $100,000, a sum that would be reduced to between $5,000 and $10,000 if it were mass-produced, say proponents, who argue this is considerably less than what a professional caregiver would cost.

She — or it — is an example of a new generation of computer-generated wizardry that the corporate world, working hand-in-hand with nonprofit research institutions, sees as the future for millions of boomers who are caregivers — and for aging boomers themselves, who most likely will opt for a degree of freedom and mobility in the face of their declining physical well-being.

Technology with a human face, both literally and figuratively, was an underlying theme of dozens of exhibits on view at this week’s White House Conference on Aging, held Sunday through Wednesday at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Northwest.

Officials noted proudly that it was the first time the policy-oriented convention, held every decade, has hosted an exhibit of any kind. The exhibit floor was crammed with delegates and visitors taking in a vast array of technology-enhanced products aimed at improving quality of life in old age.

These include:

• A medicine cabinet containing a video that, when the cabinet is open, can remind the owner visually and/or orally what medicine to take and when. It also may signal any lapse to trained staff at a remote 24-hour monitoring center.

• A wristwatch that tells the time while measuring a person’s vital signs — body motion, heart rate and blood condition — and transmits data to a remote location. A button on the side acts as an emergency alert device. Care providers can log on to a Web site to read the report.

• A memory-assisted caller ID system termed “caller ID on steroids” that is geared to Alzheimer’s disease patients. It shows a photo of the caller and recalls details of the last conversation the patient had with the caller.

• Online games employing touch-screen computer technology that stimulate a person’s mental abilities with cognitive exercises. These exercises are of special help for dementia sufferers who have retreated, out of fear or shame, into social isolation.

• A health care television channel that allows a client to use the remote to interact with a health care provider. The system targets patients with chronic conditions such as heart failure and diabetes.

Many of these devices either are prototypes or are being used in assisted-living facilities and other health care systems. Pearl, also known as Earl because of its especially low voice tone, is part of a field study being conducted by the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University.

Many employ hidden wireless computer-driven sensors in everyday objects such as beds and chairs. Sensors in a bed can tell when a person has risen for the day, notifying staff when someone is in transition from lying down to standing up. A “bedbug” icon at a monitoring station can tell when it is necessary to help someone in trouble.

It’s even projected that a cellular phone with a built-in sensor will be able to relay results of a blood sample to a medical professional.

Such technologies are being studied for their use in detecting the early onset of problems as well as monitoring already diagnosed Parkinson’s disease, various forms of dementia and neurological disorders. A sensitive gait-monitoring device, for example, can be useful in predicting the risks of falling, which is one of the most crippling effects of age and often leads to dependency on others.

Some of the items come with human names given to them by the research team; others are “adopted” by the residents of assisted-living facilities and even “dressed” for various activities. A mobile robotic system produced by Intouch Health manufacturing firm is in use in 35 long-term care facilities in the West, according to Steven Winner of Silverado Senior Living.

“Seniors talk to it like a person, and some even put clothes on it,” he says.

The robot allows for interactive communication among patients, family members and medical supervisors who may be in a distant location.

Underlying the high-tech trend are oft-quoted statistics: how 88 percent of adults older than 65 have at least one chronic condition; how by 2030 the number of Americans 65 and older is expected to double; how the half-billion people in the world age 60 or older are expected to triple in number by 2050.

Aging well requires an emphasis on preventive health measures that contribute to a life of strength and independence. For most people, however, decline invariably sets in, which accounts for the tech world’s emphasis on far-seeing, cost-effective health management solutions.

As U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta pointed out during the exhibit hall’s opening ceremony, “The vast majority of older Americans have expressed a preference to age in place” and remain as mobile as possible.

Developments to date are “just the tip of the iceberg,” according to Eric Dishman, general manager and global director of Intel’s Health Research and Innovation Group and chairman of CAST, the Center for Aging Services Technologies, a two-year-old consortium of groups involved in all aspects of aging care technology.