The Florence project has set itself the task of supporting elderly people, their relatives and caregivers in their familiar environment with the help of mobile robots, so that they can continue to lead a self-determined life.

Florence addresses the problem of demographic change by using robots as a platform that bundles a wide range of services from the field of Ambient Assisted Living (AAL), from health monitoring and guidance in daily life to social integration, and makes them available to people via a single interface, namely the robot. Within the project, a mobile system is being developed that makes it possible to offer certain telemedical services even in apartments without existing building automation.

This makes it possible, for example, to transfer various clinical assessments for checking mobility or assessing the risk of falls to the home environment. In the best case, acute situations can be prevented in advance or at least detected immediately.

Within the project, OFFIS is significantly involved in the programming of the robotic platform as well as the implementation of safety functions (detection of changes in health status, critical situations in the home, etc.). Important target points are the fusion of existing mobile and stationary sensor modalities, the development of a context-dependent interaction concept and the assurance of privacy with regard to sensitive patient data.

The project will be carried out between 02/2010 and 01/2013 at the OFFIS Health Department. It is funded by the EU (7th Framework Program).

Frenken, T.; Brell, M.; Isken, M.; Volkening, N.; Hein, A. (2012): Criteria for Quality and Safety while Performing Unobtrusive Domestic Mobility Assessments using Mobile Service Robots. In Proceedings of the 5th Congress on Ambient Assisted Living (R. Wichert and B. Eberhardt, Eds.), Springer Verlag, pp. 61-76.

Isken, M.; Frenken, T.; Brell, M.; Hein, A. (2011): Robot interaction with domestic environments considering AAL services and smart home technologies. 3rd International Workshop on Intelligent Environments Supporting Healthcare and Well-being (WISHWell’11), Nottingham, UK, July 25th-26th, 2011, in print.

Isken, M.; Vester, B.; Frenken, T.; Steen, E.-E.; Brell, M.; Hein, A. (2011): Enhancing Mobile Robots’ Navigation through Mobility Assessments in Domestic Environments. In Proceedings 4th Congress on Ambient Assisted Living (R. Wichert and B. Eberhardt, Eds.), Springer Verlag, pp. 223-238

Brell, M.; Meyer, J.; Frenken, T.; Hein, A. (2010): A Mobile Robot for Self-selected Gait Velocity Assessments in Assistive Environments. PETRA 2010 3rd International Conference on PErvasive Technologies Related to Assistive Environments June 23-25, 2010, Samos, Greece, 8 pages.