Monday, April 16, 2007

European Research Helps People With Dementia To Navigate Their Day

As approximately 1.9 million elderly people in Europe experience a form of dementia. A pan-European research project is seeking to help them 'navigate their day' and improve their quality of life.

The recently launched CogKnow project, funded under the EU's Sixth Framework Programme (FP6), aims to help people to remember, maintain social contact, perform daily life activities and enhance their feelings of safety.

Dr Nugent from the University of Ulster in the UK told CORDIS News: 'We are delighted to be involved in this project which is working towards the development of tangible home-based solutions to support persons with memory loss problems.

'The project is unique in the way that both patients and carers will contribute to the design of the discrete user-friendly technology,' he added.

As the technical coordinator of the project, the role of the university will be to research and prototype assistive technologies to support people with memory loss by providing easily recognisable prompts to help them navigate through their day.

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