Alzheimer's Disease Care Respite Technology

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease, as the disease worsens, patients will lose their cognitive and functional abilities, which in the end requiring them to be completely taken care of by their family members. In China, the number of people with AD was estimated to be 9.2 million in 2012 and it is expected to reach 20 million by 2050. This will inevitably lead to an increase in human resource inputted for the caring of AD patients. Researchers have found that family carers of people with AD are not only prone to negative psychological effects such as depression, anxiety and exhaustion but also impose a significant burden on their personal lives.
Alzheimer's disease care respite technology, as an emerging technology to support caregivers, can have a positive impact in reducing the physical and psychological burden on caregivers, while at the same time curbing the progression of the patient's illness. However, academic research on the effectiveness of respite support technology for carers is still in its early stages. This project, therefore, aims to first investigate the impact of different factors on the acceptability of care respite technology from the perspective of the physical and psychological needs of both patients and family carers, as well as from a cross-cultural perspective, in order to develop an AD care respite tech development strategy that fully integrates the needs of patients and carers. The project will combine the latest human-computer interaction technologies and machine learning methods to propose innovative health management models relate to caregiving for AD, and helping to further improve caregiving in AD.