SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Despite innovations that make it easier for seniors to keep living on their own rather than moving into special facilities, most elderly people eventually need a hand with chores and other everyday activities.
Friends and relatives often can't do all the work. Growing evidence indicates it's neither sustainable nor healthy for seniors or their loved ones. Yet demand for professional caregivers already far outstrips supply, and experts say this workforce shortage will only get worse.
So how will our society bridge this elder-care gap? In a word, robots.
Just as automation has begun to do jobs previously seen as uniquely suited for humans, like retrieving goods from warehouses, robots will assist your elderly relatives.
Would you entrust grandma to Johnny 5?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 29 2017, @03:27PM
Done right (if that's possible), an automated hospital bed could be a useful thing. Our 95 year old friend wound up in the hospital the other day with bronchitis. As expected, the hospital staff are overworked and can't really provide the timely care that would be hoped for. Prompt response to a call for assistance isn't always available, leading to messy accidents.
A smart bed could also provide various kinds of movement, helping to prevent problems. For example, our friend refused a shot of heparin (anti clotting) every day. We asked an older, experienced nurse why the doc tried to give this and the reply was a little scary--we got a very candid two part answer: It's to prevent clots from inactivity, but for most people this is not a big problem for a few days. The hospital gets reimbursed for these shots, so the staff are told to push them on everyone.