Symposium 10 - Smart Initiatives

The growth in the aging population requires caregivers to improve both efficiency and quality of healthcare. In this study, we develop an automated vision-based system for the purpose of supporting monitoring and analysis of the physical and mental well-being of senior citizens. Through collaboration with Haven of Hope Christian Service, we collected video recording data in the care center with surveillance camera. We process and extract personalized facial, activity, and interaction features from the video data using deep-learning-based AI techniques. This integrated health information systems can potentially assist caregivers to gain better insights into the seniors they are taking care of. These insights, including wellness metrics and long-term health pattern of senior citizens, can help caregivers update their caregiving strategies. In this presentation, we will report findings of our analysis and evaluate the system quantitatively. We also outline technical challenges and additional functionalities and technologies needed for offering a comprehensive system.

In the past few years, significant progress has been made in AI technology development to assist and support vulnerable groups such as the elderly. We have also seen some domestic robots appearing on the market. In parallel, the population census of 2021 showed that the elderly make up for 20% of Hong Kong’s population, a number that has doubled in the past 10 years. With one of the sharpest growth of elderly population in the world, and a limited health care and medical workforce, the need for machine-assisted care is urgent. Hong Kong has the highest life expectancy in the world largely thanks to its excellent public medical care system including timely response and treatment of stroke and heart attack patients, as well as speech and physical therapy for the elderly. With a falling fertility rate and an early retirement age, existing welfare infrastructure will be increasingly under duress and a more integrated, age-friendly, and wellness-oriented solution toward better healthcare services for the aging population is eminently important. In this talk, I will highlight how a multidisciplinary group of researchers at the Centre for AI Research at HKUST have joined forces to tackle this challenge by combining a human-centric approach coupled with the latest technological development in AI and Robotics.

Awakening Health, working with its partners Hanson Robotics and SingularityNet, is dedicated to AI robotics and digital healthcare therapy. In this rapidly emerging field, tremendous strides have been made on so many fronts and more are coming every month and year, both in the physical robotics area and virtual clinical world. From our laboratories in Tsuen Wan we have touched the world of medicine and achieved global acclaim from North America to the Middle East, Europe and Asia. More recently, we have been working hard with Hong Kong University of Science & Technology (HKUST) and Haven of hope Hospital to enable our robots to operate in real hospital settings using the Cantonese language. The results will be an important first step in Hong Kong for this exciting area.