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High-tech ideas for the aging

By STEPHEN NOHLGREN
Published December 13, 2005

WASHINGTON - From robots to video telephones to an updated version of Solitaire, university researchers and corporate giants are touting new technologies as a cure for spiraling health care costs.

"We have to do something different. About 85 percent of medical costs are associated with about 15 percent of the people, ones with chronic diseases," Intel chairman Craig Barrett told delegates Monday at the White House Conference on Aging.

Intel, for example, has developed a telephone/computer that flashes a photograph of the person who is calling, along with a brief summary of their previous call.

It's designed for people with mild dementia who often are frightened to answer telephones because they don't know who is calling or why. The computer screen also shows photos of family and friends so one touch of the finger allows the phone-user to activate speed-dial.

If the person grows ill or depressed and stops calling people, the computer can alert a doctor, nurse or family members, who can step in and prevent isolation.

The Intel phone was one of dozens of prototype devices demonstrated at the White House Conference, a once-a-decade gathering that helps plot aging policy for Congress and the president.

Other innovations include:

--From the University of Virginia, sensors imbedded in a blanket placed beneath a person's mattress that can monitor heart rate, restlessness and sleep apnea. Other sensors underneath carpets can monitor the steadiness and speed of someone's gait. Doctors can analyze the data during regular visits or receive alerts if something suddenly goes wrong with the patient.

--From the University of Colorado at Boulder, videocameras placed in the homes of people with Parkinson's disease that allow speech therapists to treat them from a distance.

Parkinson's patient Pavel Vladu performed a breath test from his home in New York to demonstrate how it works. "Aaaaahhhhh," he belted out, as long and loudly as he could. The speech therapist could see his face, hear his voice and view measurements on the computer in Washington.

By avoiding office visits and allowing one therapist to treat many more patients, the video hookups quickly pay for themselves, said Intel's Eric Dishman, who led a tour of exhibits. Soon, cell phones will be programmed to pick up Parkinsonian tremors in voices years before the disease might otherwise be detected, he said.

--From Accenture Technology Labs, a medicine cabinet with computer screen that tells people what drug to take on what day, with food or without food, and reorders drugs when they run low. If a man picks up his wife's pill bottle by mistake, the computer warns him to put it back.

--From the Oregon Health and Science University, computerized Solitaire that tracks cognitive and planning skills every time a person plays, creating an early warning for dementia and other illnesses.

--From Intouch Health, a $120,000 robot with video conferencing that allows doctors to diagnose patients from afar. Hospitals around the country already have bought about 40, said Timothy Wright, an Intouch marketing executive.

The robots speed up discharge because surgeons typically make rounds in the morning, when recent lab tests often aren't available, Wright said. Patients otherwise ready to go home end up staying an extra day.

Now doctors sitting in their offices or homes can revisit their patients later in the day - when the lab tests are in - by controlling the robot with a joystick.

Stroke victims in emergency rooms benefit particularly, he said, because they must be seen by a neurologist before they can receive critical clot-busting medication. A wait beyond three hours can damage chances of recovering. The robot lets a neurologist view the charts and examine the patient from afar, speeding treatment.

Sensors on a wristwatch can take someone's vital signs and distribute them to computers via wireless communication, Dishman said. Placed around the house, sensors can tell children what elderly parents are doing, whether they are opening the refrigerator to get food or have left the stove on.

A house already wired with a computer and broadband communication might be retrofitted with sensors for a few hundred dollars. But even $2,000 would be a bargain, Dishman said, if sensors delay placement in a nursing home by even a few weeks.

[Last modified December 13, 2005, 01:31:15]