Nursing homes and the aging services industry, in general, are not widely regarded as hotbeds of technological progress. This, however, is about to change. In a future post, I will discuss some of the exciting innovations that Intel’s Digital Health Group is pursuing, but for now I would like to highlight two recent technological advances which I believe will soon begin appearing in nursing homes across the country.
The first concerns the startling amount progress that MIT and the U.S. Army are making in the development of exoskeleton’s — wearable robotic suits—which are capable of carrying an 80-pound-plus load. The idea is to design a device that soldiers and firefighters can wear that will allow them to lift heavy objects. The application ofthis technology to the nursing home industry is that it will help nurses who must engage in the back-breaking work of turning elderly patients every few hours (to keep them from getting bed sores). There is already a great workforce shortage in the nursing industry and this gap is only expected to grow larger in the years ahead as the workforce ages. Exoskeletons hold the potential to not only make nurse’s jobs slightly easier, they can also reduce worker compensation claims by preventing back injuries. Executive and managers in the industry should expect to be employing this technology is the next 3 to 5 years.
A second technology they should be looking to incorporate are “therapy tiles.” These robotic systems generate specialized games that challenge the human body’s ability and help patients recover faster. According to this article in Wired, patients become so engaged with the therapy tiles that “healing becomes almost an afterthought.” (Along these lines, I also see immense potential for this technology in helping America’s growing number of obese children lose weight—if we can’t get them off the couch to exercise in the great outdoors, perhaps we can at least engage them in more vigorous video games).
Jack Uldrich is a writer, public speaker and host of jumpthecurve.net. He is the author of seven books, including Jump the Curve and The Next Big Thing is Really Small: How Nanotechnology Will Change the Future of Your Business. He is also a frequenter speaker on future trends, innovation, change management and executive leadership to the health care and aging services industry.
