Residents Aware Network for Intelligent Assistance to Enable Aging-in-Place
Ramana Reddy, Saribala Udaykiran Kumar Reddy · 2019
As society is aging it is imperative to find suitable technologies that can enable seniors to live in their own homes longer to minimize the social costs associated with institutional care. While there are many apps and gadgets to deal with individual situations such as fall detection, smart medicine dispenser, remote doctor visit etc. there are no comprehensive holistic solutions that can deal with most of the challenges associated with aging. This is a complex task involving many disciplines. At West Virginia University (USA), we put together an interdisciplinary group including Electrical Engineers, Computer Scientists, Computer Engineers, Medical and Healthcare Professionals and Social Workers to create a realistic testbed to demonstrate integrated solutions that can be scaled-up by start-up companies using a wide variety of resources available at the University. This system known as RANIA (Residents Aware Network for Intelligent Assistance) is being developed by a group of nearly 100 students under the guidance of faculty from the College of Engineering, School of Health Sciences and the School of Social Work. In addition, we have also created a Collaboratory to enable participation from institutions around the world to create their own unique solutions suitable for specific environments. We believe this project can have profound impact on aging populations around the world by establishing the technical feasibility and economic viability of technologies that can enhance quality of living not only by delaying the need for institutional care but also reducing social costs associated with caring for seniors.