The effect of digital healthcare and well-being platforms on the capabilities of elderly

Abstract

In Europe there are many countries that are experiencing issues with an aging population. In fact, many countries are changing their welfare and healthcare systems in order to facilitate the change. Consequently, elderly people are required to remain in their own homes for as long as possible and organize their own healthcare. Doing so can be a complex process and assistance in the form of a digital platform can offer the solution for elderly to age in their own households. This type of social innovation and other social functions enabled by a platform can enable elderly to age in place. This research proposes to set up an experiment in order to measure the effect a digital platform has on the capabilities of elderly to live at home. The results show that a digital platform will in fact increase capabilities of elderly. Such a digital platform has not only a positive effect on elderly, but also on their voluntary caretakers. Thereby, the platform enables social innovation by lowering thresholds for users to participate in healthcare tasks. Based on the results, recommendations are made that can be used to further the development of platforms for health and well-being and increase their effectiveness and potentially facilitate widespread societal change