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Saturday, March 23, 2019

Dementia Caregivers Want Robots for Joy and Sorrow to Take Care of Patients

By  March 23, 2019  , , , , , ,  6 comments

Dementia Caregivers Robots
Example of one of the robots designed by caregivers (Image Credit: Healthcare Robotics Lab/University of California San Diego)
A bit of robotic assistance can help people with dementia and their caregivers. Robots current available for the elderly help them around the house but there aren’t many robots that assist people with dementia. So, researchers at the University of California, San Diego wanted to find out what kinds of robots would actually help. They spent six months co-designing robots with informal caregivers for people with dementia, such as family members. 


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They found that caregivers wanted the robots to fulfill two major roles: support positive moments shared by caregivers and their loved ones; and lessen caregivers' emotional stress by taking on difficult tasks, such as answering repeated questions and restricting unhealthy food.


“Caregivers conceived of robots not only managing difficult aspects of caregiving -- but also for supporting joyful and fun activities,” said Laurel Riek, a professor of computer science at UC San Diego, and the paper's senior author.


For the study, the research team led by Riek built relationships with three different dementia day care centers in San Diego County, reportsUC-San Diego.

Elderly dementia patient
Image: Creative commons
Researchers conducted a series of interviews and hands-on workshops with caregivers.


  • Based on the results of the six-month long community design process, the team identified various characteristics and designs a robot should have to support the caregivers and patients with dementia:
  • Robots should help redirect conversations when repetitive questioning becomes burdensome
  • Robots should be integrated into everyday objects that the people with dementia are already familiar with, or borrow features from those objects.
  • Robots should be able to adapt to new situations and to the behavior of the person with dementia.
  • Robots should be able to learn from end users, and customize and personalize their interaction and responses.
  • Robots should have human-like components. That is not to say that they should look human. Rather the machines could, for example, use a real human voice or face.


·       Robots should have human-like components. That is not to say that they should look human. Rather the machines could, for example, use a real human voice or face.


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