Stakeholder involvement in the innovation process: An example in medical robotics, the ROBO-K project

In the field of medical robotics, many studies have called for the integration of end-users in the innovation process. The objective is to identify the factors that facilitate (or not) the use of the designed robots and thus try to guarantee their diffusion in the care services. This recommendation was followed in the ROBO-K project. The ROBO-K project proposes the design and development of a mobile, interactive robot dedicated to gait rehabilitation. This project was initiated by BA Healthcare, a medical robotics company. The design of a robot was accompanied to achieve the targeted therapeutic objectives by taking into account the requirements related to the needs of the patients and the practitioners; the care activity and the institutions involved. A follow-up by the social acceptability of the technology led to focus the innovation process on a co-construction activity involving all stakeholders. This co-construction activity was decisive, as it guided the definition of functional expectations and the technical specifications of the prototype developed. It was completed by a test phase of the prototype (in a care situation for 5 months). The results show the relevance to involve all the stakeholders in all the design and development phases of the robotic device. However, they underline the difficulties or limits linked to this type of approach in terms of innovation.

The Shape of Care: Patterns of Family Caregiving Among Chinese Adults in the Middle to Later Stage of Life

Due to the lack of institutional support, families have long been the primary caregivers in China. Most studies to date only focused on one single care activity during a particular life course stage. Nonetheless, older adults today are more likely to care for multiple family members concurrently or sequentially (serial caregivers). The studies on discrete snapshots of care activities failed to capture the patterns of family caregiving overtime. Utilizing four waves of longitudinal data from CHARLS (2011-2018, N=17,039), this study particularly focuses on care activities to grandchildren, parents, and spouse, and maps out the family caregiving patterns overtime. Using latent profile analysis, this study identifies five family caregiving patterns: 1). Light grandchild caregivers (27%), who on average provided 4.3 years’ grandchild care mostly; 2). Heavy grandchild caregivers (11%), who on average on provided 7 years’ grandchild care mostly; 3). Light caregivers for grandchildren and parents (7%), who sequentially provided 1-year care to grandchildren and parents; 4). Heavy serial caregiver (6%), who mostly provided care to spouse and grandchildren with higher overlapping years; 5). Overall light caregivers (49%), who on average provided less than one year of care to any recipient. The preliminary results suggest that heavy serial caregivers (6%) far worst in terms of depressive symptoms and more likely to report worsened self-rated health; and overall light caregivers (49%) have the lowest depressive symptoms and more likely to report good self-rated health.

ACTIVITY OF THE FAMILY CARERS OF THE ELDERLY DURING SARS-COV-2 PANDEMIC

Article focuses on various aspects of the family carers activity in the age of pandemia. The carers activity has been divided into several categories: care activity; activity related to the health issues; occupational activity and the activity in the sphere of new technologies, especial digital tools and social media. The researches used in the article has shown that the decline of the access to the formal services (both social and medical) and the shortening of the informal, social contacts led to the increasing burden of the family carers. Thus, the care activity has been intensified, so that other forms of activities could be retrenched. Also, other restrictions and risks of that time could have impact on non-care activities of family caregivers. Pandemic time affected also the use of digital technologies in many aspects, such as searching for information, communication, contacts with formal institutions, groups of support and webinars attendance. Also labour activity opportunities has been changed that time. On the one hand, development of tele-work has given potential chance to reconciliation between working and caring duties, but on the other hand additional care burdens and difficult situation on labour market could make the labour activity of carers difficult to manage.