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Solutions for healthy ageing: how technology can make a difference
How do we help older adults maintain their independence and quality of life with healthy ageing? Professor Alex Mihailidis, Scientific Director and CEO of AGE-WELL Network of Centres of Excellence argues that improving wellbeing in older people should come from innovative technology. Research finds that technological advancements can help older people maintain relationships with family and friends, reduce social isolation, pursue hobbies, manage all aspects of health, and stay active and in their own homes as they age. To further this research, AGE-WELL brings together researchers, older adults, caregivers, partner organizations (industry, government, community) and future leaders to accelerate the delivery of technology-based solutions that increase safety and security, support independent living and enhance social participation. While technology can never replace the human touch, it is an essential tool in the toolbox to support healthy ageing, and for this to improve for the older generation, technologies must become accessible, affordable and available to all.

This publication presents articles on Aging-in-Place, Assistive Technology, Monitoring and Telehealth, Transportation and Mobility, and Design. The section on assistive technology (AT) represents arguably the most mature and generic aspect of technology and aging; except that AT can hardly be regarded really as a specific discipline any longer. Assistive devices and systems command an expansive gamut of technological and engineering specialties, drawing upon mechanical engineering and industrial design at one end of the field and cybernetic systems engineering and brain-computer user interface.

Challenges and solutions -- Global challenges in the 21st century -- What does innovation look like in research? -- Understanding impact -- Envisioning impact at multiple levels -- Combining good science and real-world impact -- Achieving impact -- How can researchers achieve impact? -- Turning ideas into products and services: the innovation pipeline -- Working towards impact -- Team work and building meaningful partnerships (transdisciplinarity) -- Project management and administration -- Commercialization: defining, understanding, and creating your market -- Managing intellectual property -- Co-production and stakeholder involvement -- Reaching the hard-to-reach: a community approach -- Knowledge mobilization -- Education and training -- Regulatory and legal issues -- Local connections: ecosystems of research and innovation -- Evaluating and demonstrating impact -- Concluding remarks. .

Objectives: The COVID-19 pandemic is having a major impact on the lives of everyone, but in particular on the health and well-being of older people. It has also disrupted the way that individuals access services and interact with one another, and physical distancing and "Stay at Home" orders have seen digital interaction become a necessity. While these restrictions have highlighted the importance of technology in everyday life, little is known about how older adults have responded to this change. Methods: Two surveys, one in 2019 and another in 2020 collected data on a combined total of 1923 older adults aged 65 years and older in Canada. These looked at how older adults think about and use technology, with the 2020 survey additionally questioning how COVID-19 has impacted their use and attitudes towards technology. Results: While older adults feel more isolated in 2020, many feel positive about the benefits of technology and have increased technology use during the pandemic to support their health, wellness, and communication needs. Discussion: The results highlight the potential of technology for supporting older adults in various aspects of healthy aging. While these results point to the opportunities afforded by technology, challenges remain, such as how social and economic factors influence technology uptake.

Ambient assisted living technologies could support people experiencing physical or cognitive challenges, to maintain social identities and complex activities of daily living. Although there has been substantial investment in developing ambient assisted living innovation, less effort has been devoted to understanding how to evaluate the impact of ambient assisted living on physical and mental health. Taking a theory-based evaluation approach, we suggest firstly that ambient assisted living technologies rely on networks of people and organizations to function, and secondly, analysing the changing structure of networks can bridge the gap between socio-technological change and individual-level capabilities. We present conceptual arguments for taking a network perspective in ambient assisted living evaluations, illustrated with examples from our own group's work on technology use among older people with cognitive impairments. We then discuss the different types of network-based evaluation approaches available, their theoretical assumptions, and the sort of research questions they could address.