Social Innovation / Innovation Enhancement Projects
Social Innovation / Innovation Enhancement
There are many ideas on how to support and maintain the aging population’s quality of life and independence, but there are few opportunities to test these projects. With the funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), ICCER and several of its members have been able to take some of these ideas and test and implement them in several short-term projects. These projects range from addressing hearing challenges and robotic companion animals to empowering residents to actively participate in addressing wellness barriers.
These projects were funded by:
Projects
Site-Wide Mental Health Pro-Attention Program
This project piloted a program aimed towards increasing the daily sense of purpose of clients and positively impact their mental well-being. This pilot helped the facility understand the level of support needed on-site and guided the formation and implementation of behaviour management. From this project, the program facilitators were able to design a toolkit that can serve as a guide for other facilities to implement the program
Organization: Carewest
Year Completed: 2022
Leisure Interest Measure
The Leisure Interest Measure project developed a resident-run program that aimed to build recreational programs based on the resident’s interests. Using the Leisure Interest Measure (LIM) to assess the leisure profile of the site, this provided more insight on the interests of the residents while also ensuring that the resident’s needs are met. By encouraging the residents to develop and facilitate their own recreation programs, this allowed them to have a sense of purpose and control over their leisure pursuits. This also helped to build the confidence and independence of the residents.
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Organization: Lifestyle Options
Year Completed: 2023
Robotic Companion Animals
Lifestyle Options developed the “Robotic Companion Animal” project to improve their resident’s quality of life, specifically for those in the Memory Care Households. After seeing the positive effect of robotic companion animals on their residents, they wanted to evaluate the affect of the robotic pets on their quality of life.
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Organization: Lifestyle Options
Year Completed: 2023
Tovertafel
The goal for this project was to implement a structured technology program for residents with late-stage dementia to provide purpose and increase their quality of life. This program was implemented using the Tovertafel Tower, a projector with interactive activities for users.
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Organization: Lifestyle Options
Year Completed: 2025
Find My People
Using the results from their 2021 annual resident survey, Silvera for Seniors developed two projects to address specific areas to improve their services. The projects developed were “Find My People” and “Meeting Hearing Challenges”. The “Find My People” project was developed to support these residents who were interested in activities that would improve their quality of life. This project was developed in response to difficulties that residents had identified in socializing with others and their dissatisfaction with the available options for developing their skills and/or knowledge.
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Organization: Silvera for Seniors
Year Completed: 2023
Meeting Hearing Challenges
From the 2021 survey, the results had shown that there were residents who did not participate in activities due to hearing challenges. To address these challenges, Silvera developed the “Meeting Hearing Challenges” project to support residents who identify with moderate to severe hearing challenges and to plan for continuous implementation of the successful hearing supports.
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Organization: Silvera for Seniors
Year Completed: 2023
Empowering Wellness
The goal of this project is to empower residents to actively participate in identifying wellness barriers, then brainstorming and prototyping solutions that foster a sense of autonomy, purpose, and improved overall well-being. This study found that personalizing care through resident engagement in exploring and identifying individual needs empowers and contributes meaningfully to quality of life. Creative design workshops and assistive technologies integration processes focusing on person centred care practices enhances residents’ well-being. Creative design workshops and active creative engagement in the design and development of AT solutions increased well-being, met needs, fostered a sense of purpose, and improved quality of life.
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Organizations: Red Deer Polytechnic, Bethany Care Society
Year Completed: 2024
Student Projects
In addition to the above projects, three student projects were also supported. These projects were developed as a part of 'Healthcare for Aging Canadians Student Innovation Challenge' by TECHNATION and NorQuest College.
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EchoBot
EchoBot is an AI-driven translation robot that will address language discordance between non-English speaking residents and care providers in long term care homes. The robot will use artificial intelligence programs to provide translation services, including DeepL Pro as the language translation software and Alexa for voice technology. Through the integration of these two AI softwares, we aim to provide more reliable, accurate, accessible and regularly available translation services in long term care homes. In the form of a robot, EchoBot acts as a physical presence that emulates a human translator and provides cognitive stimulation for residents, and also reduces technological barriers for usage as the software does not require a phone or app downloads. We hope that by bridging communication gaps, we can enhance care quality by helping residents feel safe, comfortable and understood
Anciana
Anciana is a conversational AI app designed to combat cognitive decline in the elderly. Using cutting-edge artificial intelligence and research in elderly care, Anciana offers structured daily conversations lasting around 30 minutes. These conversations target memory, perception, attention, and other cognitive faculties to help maintain and enhance cognitive abilities.
Traditional in-person mental rehabilitation for seniors can be expensive, while existing brain games used to mitigate cognitive decline lack the ability to adapt to an individual user's needs. Anciana bridges this gap by providing affordable yet high-quality cognitive rehabilitation services tailored for seniors, promoting better cognitive health and longevity
LifeTech
LifeTech care provides a matching platform to support older adults and their families to find technology to age in place better. Additionally, they support startups and small to medium sized age-tech companies offering consulting services to aid in understanding of the market and implementation
Partners
