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EMERGE: Emergency Monitoring and Prevention

Abstract: Improving the quality of life of elderly people is an emerging issue within our information society for both research and development. Demographical changes in Europe lead us to expect that the percentage of older people within the population will continue to increase in the future. New Technologies, including ambient intelligence technologies, awaken the hope of ubiquitous support in daily life. Most of all, there is a necessity to protect the elderly from emergency situations where possible and to provide rapid assistance when this is not possible. Basically, the use of technology is not always easy, however, elderly people are confronted with a number of additional problems due to its complexity. Further problems are often
caused by physical and/or cognitive impairment. Distrust, fear, anxiety and consequently frequent rejection of technology must be taken into consideration. A currently acute issue is that of delayed calls to emergency medical services, which can lead to increased hospitalization and the necessity for elderly people to move into nursing homes, consequently unnecessarily decreasing their quality of life and also involving considerable expenditure.
These challenges are addressed in the EMERGE (EMERGEncy Monitoring and Prevention) project. The approach is to use ambient and unobtrusive sensors to monitor activity, location, and vital data. Daily routine can be tracked in order to detect abnormalities and to create early indicators for potentially arising trends and emergencies in advance. One goal is to recognize emergency situations at home with the help of ambient and unobtrusive technology, to develop a Human-Capability Model and to provide adequate assistance when needed. In addition to technological solutions, models for complete systems will be developed, which include the personal environment as well as recorded sensor data and which can be customtailored
exactly to the needs of the end users. The impact of the developed prototypical
solution on quality of life will be measured in an Assisted Living Laboratory and in a
multinational site evaluation. It is expected that EMERGE will help elderly people to live a safer, self-determined life and to stay longer in their preferred environment. The EMERGE consortium consists of 9 European partners: Westpfalz-Klinikum, Kaiserslautern; Siemens AG; Microsoft European Innovation Center (all Germany), Art of Technology, Switzerland, NCSR Demokritos and e-ISOTIS (both Greece); Bay Zoltan Foundation, Hungary and Medical University Graz (Austria). The main coordinator is the Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE). Within EMERGE, the Medical University Graz (MUG) is responsible for the areas HumanComputer Interaction, Usability Engineering and Life-Long Learning. Research within the HCI4MED area of the Institute of Medical Informatics Statistics and Documentation (IMI) integrates in addition to the necessary
technological aspects human-centered, cognitive aspects of medical information processing.

Keywords: Usability research; Medical informatics; experimental psychology; cognition psychology; educational psychology; Benutzergerechtes Design; Kognitive Performanz Unterstützung; Lebensbegleitendes Lernen; Mensch-Computer Kommunikation

Local Subprojectlead:: Holzinger Andreas

Duration:: 01.02.2007-31.01.2010

Programme:: EU (FP-6)

Subprogramme: Ambient Assisted Living and Life Long Learning Support

EU-Project Instruments: Spec. Target. o Inn. Project (STREP)

Type of Research: tech development

Staff: Holzinger, Andreas, Project Leader; Errath, Maximilian, Co-worker; Bloice, Marcus, Co-worker

MUG Research Units: Institute for Medical Informatics, Statistics and Documentation

Project partners: Art of Technology AG, Switzerland; Bay Zoltan Alkalmazott Kutatasi Kozalapitvany, Hungary; Europäisches Microsoft Innovations Center GmbH, Germany; Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V., Germany; Information Society Open To ImpairmentS e-ISOTIS, Greece; National Centre for Scientific Research "Demokritos", Greece; Siemens Aktiengesellschaft, Germany; Westpfalz-Klinikum GmBH, Germany

Funded by: Europäische Kommission, Rue de la Loi, Brussels, Belgium

Project results published: > The effect of previous exposure to technology on a... UNIVERSAL ACCESS INF. 2011; 10(3): 245-260.; > Investigating Usability Metrics for the Design and... In: Miesenberger, K; Klaus, J; Zagler, W; Karshmer, A; editors(s). Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS 5105). 5105(1) : Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer; 2008. p. 98-105. (ISBN: 978-3-540-70539-0); > Introduction to the Special Thematic Session: Huma... In: Miesenberger, K; Klaus, J; Zagler, W; Karshmer, A; editors(s). Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS 5105). 5105(1) : Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer; 2008. p. 18-21. (ISBN: 978-3-540-70539-0)