What a time to be alive! We’re living longer and healthier. Thanks to greater access to healthy food and advances in modern medicine.

Driving this change are global trends in ageing populations. There’s an increase in general life expectancy across most developing countries. Additionally, the number of people over the age of 65 outnumber children under five years of age for the first time in history!

With this change comes the challenge of whether society has all the right systems in place to care for people as they live longer.

The good news is we’ve developed Smarter Safer Homes technology. Older Australians living at home will be able to monitor their health and send real-time data to their healthcare providers.

And we’re partnering with Australian company HSC Technology Group Ltd to address this challenge.

Growing healthy ageing

• The United Nations says by 2050, one in six people in the world will be over 65 years of age.
• The World Health Organization (WHO) says adults over 60 years of age are the fastest-growing age group in the Western Pacific region (this includes Australia!).
• WHO has also dedicated the next 10 years as the Decade of Healthy Ageing.
• Australia’s ageing population is predicted to rise to 22 per cent by 2056.

We’ve learnt from this year that a global pandemic severely impacts the health and wellbeing of our elderly population.

So to foster healthy ageing, we need to look at ways we can support our systems to provide responsive healthcare.

Technology to help healthy ageing at home

There is a growing trend for older Australians to live at home. In fact, more than 80 per cent of senior Australians are opting to do this. There are a multitude of factors to consider when the time eventually comes for support options. Things like readily available access to clinicians and health advice, and what happens in the event of an emergency or a fall.

Our Smarter Safer Homes platform is a patent-pending smart-sensor technology. It’s been trialled successfully across Australia in aged care settings. As a result, it delivers high quality, in-home care suitable for independent living.

Together with HSC Technology, our technology platform creates a sensor-based monitoring system. It can send real-time data to an older person’s family and healthcare team, delivered through a seamless, secure and transparent new health monitoring solution. Data from sensors placed around the home will track daily living activities as meal preparation, mobility, hygiene and grooming.

Offering peace of mind to families and healthcare teams

So what does this mean for older Australians?

It means having access to a technology platform like this has the potential to support greater quality care. Additionally, it allows a more informed continuity of care for citizens who choose to live independently.

Consequently, the technology will help to keep families updated remotely. But it will also provide a more informed healthcare information to medical care teams and clinicians. This is a proactive and positive step towards living a longer and healthier life in the comfort of our own homes.