Kebun Baru pilots tech-integrated facility for elderly living alone
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Deepa Sundar
A pilot integrated aged care facility with video-based technology to monitor elderly residents in a non-invasive manner has opened in Kebun Baru.
The Integrated Dementia Assisted Living facility, which began operations on Monday in a Housing Board unit, caters to vulnerable elderly living alone in the constituency. It currently provides free daytime care to this group.
The facility has two cameras and a sound sensor to monitor the elderly, while using privacy-masking solutions to ensure their personal privacy is respected.
The system also comes with artificial intelligence (AI) and sound analytics software capable of detecting falls and signs of distress.
The video feed will be monitored by volunteer caregivers from Kebun Baru Community Club and the system will trigger an alarm when falls or distress is detected. The caregivers will then provide medical assistance or notify the emergency services, if necessary.
The pilot is conducted by video management software company Milestone Systems, AI company Senturian Solutions and the Alzheimer's Disease Association.
"We have a group of very vulnerable seniors... we want to help them age successfully and independently," said Kebun Baru MP Henry Kwek at Milestone Systems' Integration Symposium 2021 yesterday.
On the issue of privacy, Mr Benjamin Low, Milestone Systems' vice-president of Asia-Pacific, told The Straits Times that the system uses silhouettes instead of actual images of people to ensure privacy-sensitive monitoring and absolute personal data protection.
"This allows the system to extract only metadata from video footage that is critical in identifying elderly persons in distress, while censoring any non-essential physical and personal details," he said in an e-mail interview.
But residents are required to fill a Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA) form to allow hospitals to release relevant medical information that will facilitate their care.
The pilot is part of efforts to tackle an ageing population. The Centre for Ageing Research and Education projects that 83,000 elderly people will live alone in Singapore by 2030.
Falls accounted for 40 per cent of injury-related deaths here last year, with one in three community-dwelling elderly aged 65 years and above having at least one fall within a year.
