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Supporting caregivers in assisted living facilities for persons with disabilities: a user study

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Abstract

Research activities on designing healthcare support systems in the field of ambient assisted living are mainly focused on addressing two problems: improving the quality of life for people in their own homes, especially the elderly; and supporting nurses and physicians in hospitals. However, few papers focus on designing specific systems for supporting caregivers that work with persons with disabilities in the context of assisted living facilities (ALFs). This paper intends to contribute to filling this gap and presents a series of guidelines for designing systems that could effectively support caregivers in tasks such as monitoring ALF inhabitants, attending to their assistance requests and managing notes and reminders regarding daily activities. These design guidelines derive from the qualitative analysis of a comprehensive user study, carried out in Northern Italy, of three focus groups conducted with a total of 30 caregivers in three different ALFs for persons with physical and cognitive disabilities.

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Notes

  1. The Action Plan for the EU Health Workforce is publicly available at http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/health_consumer/docs/swd_ap_eu_healthcare_workforce_en.pdf (last visited on July 14, 2014).

  2. The persons with disabilities to which the authors refer to are adults between 18 and 64 years old with physical or mental (cognitive) disabilities. In 2004, persons with disabilities corresponded to about 5 % of the total population of Italy (of which the major part was still living with their families rather than in ALFs), according to the 2004 ISTAT report “Disability in Italy” available at http://www3.istat.it/dati/catalogo/20100513_00/arg_09_37_la_disabilita_in_Italia.pdf (last visited on July 11, 2014).

  3. An assisted living facility (ALF) is a housing facility for persons with disabilities. ALFs ensure health, safety and well-being conditions for people with mental or physical disabilities by monitoring and assisting them with the activities of daily living. In these facilities, unlike in hospitals or nursing homes, there are no full-time nurses nor physicians providing medical treatments.

  4. Nursing homes are residences for people who require continual medical care and assistance in their daily activities, usually elderly.

  5. http://www.coopfrassati.com (last visited on July 2, 2014).

  6. The Italian law with the Ministerial Decree dei Lavori Pubblici n. 236 del 14/06/89 requires buzzers, at least in the bathroom and in the bedroom of people with disabilities.

  7. The inhabitants real names have been changed for privacy reasons.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Cooperativa Sociale P.G. Frassati and all the caregivers that voluntarily participated in the focus groups for their time and collaboration.

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  1. Politecnico di Torino, Corso Duca degli Abruzzi, 24, 10129, Torino, Italy

    Sebastián Aced López, Fulvio Corno & Luigi De Russis

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  1. Sebastián Aced López
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  2. Fulvio Corno
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Correspondence to Sebastián Aced López.

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Aced López, S., Corno, F. & De Russis, L. Supporting caregivers in assisted living facilities for persons with disabilities: a user study. Univ Access Inf Soc 14, 133–144 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-014-0400-1

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