Application of novel industrial scale robot automation in elderly care

The potential of automation and robots for elderly care is reviewed. Robot automation for widespread application must be well integrated into societal and other automated systems and services, including e.g. task planning, order/assignment generation and invoicing. A large number of applications and sub-service/component providers will decrease the costs, which will speed up applicability further - often with precipitous growth in numbers. Related estimates and predictions in the literature are reviewed. A few robot applications suitable for Finnish experience and industrial structure are studied in greater detail - e.g. who will develop them, and where, why and what is the estimated demand. The vision of the following scenarios - used simultaneously in parallel or partially - has directed the work resulting in this paper: (1) Telepresence, wearables and remote health supervision, (2) Parcel and person logistics for extended home living, (3) Hospital and dormitory logistics and (4) Smart home and bed/chair AGV for the physically disabled. The scenario (1) is assumed especially to decrease the costs of health care when massively exploited, and to make health care more preventive, and the scenario (4) to improve the life quality of handicapped persons.