Robots in Health and Social Care: A Complementary Technology to Home Care and Telehealthcare?

Robotics

Torbjørn S. Dahl¹ 

[1] Centre for Robotics and Neural Systems, Plymouth University, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK; E-Mail:

关键词: robots;    robotics;    telehealthcare;    Ambient Assisted Living;    assistive technology;    social care;   

DOI  :  10.3390/robotics3010001

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

This article offers a brief overview of most current and potential uses and applications of robotics in health/care and social care, whether commercially ready and available on the market or still at the various stages of research and prototyping. We provide carefully hand-picked examples and pointers to on-going research for each set of identified robotics applications and then discuss the main ingredients for the success of these applications, as well as the main issues surrounding their adoption for everyday use, including sustainability in non-technical environments, patient/user safety and acceptance, ethical considerations such as patient/user privacy, and cost effectiveness. We examine how robotics could (partially) fill in some of the identified gaps in current telehealthcare and home care/self-care provisions. The article concludes with a brief glimpse at a couple of emerging developments and promising applications in the field (soft robots and robots for disaster response) that are expected to play important roles in the future.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.