The past life, this life and future of nursing robots

1. The development wave of elderly care robots started in the 1960s

The starting time of elderly care service robots dates back to the second half of the 20th century, the earliest development from medical, military, industrial and other fields, to the 1990s, various research institutions began to realize that all aspects of the needs of the elderly life can be solved by robots, and began to gradually focus on the needs of the elderly population.

2. The research on rehabilitation robots started in the 1960s.

The earliest commercialized rehabilitation robot was Handy1 developed by Mike Topping of the UK. After the initial version of Lokomat by HOCOMA company of Switzerland was developed in 2000, the rehabilitation robot entered the period of full development.

The service objects of the rehabilitation robot are mainly semi-disabled elderly people with neurological injuries such as stroke and spinal cord injury. The rehabilitation robot can improve the accuracy and recovery rate of the rehabilitation program through multiple training data and finally feed back to the doctor in the form of a report.

With the gradual attention of countries to the field of rehabilitation medicine and the huge demand of consumers for light rehabilitation medical equipment, wearable rehabilitation + assisted walking exoskeleton robots have emerged. After launching in 2012, Israeli exoskeleton robot company Rewalk went public in the United States in 2014.

3. Nursing robots have been developed since the 1980s;

Initially, the American TRC company developed service robots for hospitals to assist nurses, and later due to the huge demand for old-age care, more robots for disabled elderly care were developed.

The care robot aims to help the elderly in their daily life, mainly solving problems such as constipation, turning over, alarm, and health monitoring.

In addition, there are also some robots that provide help for caregivers to reduce their work load and work intensity, and even realize multi-person, all-round management, and provide more detailed services for patients.

At present, the main research direction is to develop more targeted robots after subdividing the needs of the elderly, and to improve the efficiency of nursing management.

4. Companion robots have gradually developed since Britain and the United States in the 1990s;

Later, with the gradual maturity of artificial intelligence technology, from a simple communication robot gradually developed into a companion robot, most of the products on the market are products used by the pan-age group, and there are fewer companion robots developed specifically for the elderly.

Companion robots can partially meet the psychological needs of the elderly, especially the empty-nesters. In addition to entertaining functions, it will also undertake certain health and life assistant duties, such as taking medicine reminders, smart home and other functions.

With the continuous progress of robot technology, in addition to gradually covering all aspects of the life of the elderly, the elderly robot is also integrating with the smart home to improve and optimize the living environment of the elderly.

|| Three driving factors: caregiver shortage + GPD per capita exceeding $10,000 + robot policy

For China, "severe shortage of caregivers + per capita GDP exceeding $10,000 + policy planning" will become the three major factors driving the development of the domestic elderly care robot industry.

1. Serious shortage of nursing staff: By the end of 2018, the proportion of people aged 65 and above in China reached 11.9%, and the degree of population aging continued to deepen, with about 40 million disabled and semi-disabled elderly people.

2. Per capita GDP exceeding $10,000: the level of economic development is an important factor for the release of elderly care demand. When the per capita GDP of the United States and Japan reaches $10,000, the pension industry enters a stage of rapid development, and China's per capita GDP will reach $P1 million this year.

3. Robot policy planning: In 2016, the "13th Five-Year Plan" proposed that we should vigorously develop industrial robots, service robots, surgical robots and military robots, and promote the commercial use of artificial intelligence technology in various fields;

In 2017, the Three-year Action Plan to Promote the development of a new generation of artificial Intelligence Industry (2018-2020) proposed that by 2020, intelligent home service robots and intelligent public service robots will achieve mass production and application, and robots such as medical rehabilitation and helping the elderly and disabled will achieve prototype production, complete technical and functional verification, and realize more than 20 application demonstrations.

A large number of service robot related policies have been introduced successively, which has provided strong support and guidance for the development of pension robot industry in our country.

Japanese case: Policies to promote the development of elderly care robots, Panasonic, NEC and other large enterprises to set up a special division for the elderly