Jianing, 75, unlocks her screen to check her glucose levels when ‘Mia,’ her digital health coach, interrupts: “Good morning Jianing! I’ve sent your weekly data to your doctor. She recommends dropping by for a visit. Can I schedule you for a check-up next Wednesday at 3 PM?”
Mia, the virtual coach avatar, relies on a wide range of continuously collected data – from electrical signals collected by the electrocardiograms (EKG) sensor in Jianing’s smart watch to the changes in her voice and speed of interaction with her smartphone screen.
Jianing agrees to that time and thanks Mia. Mia follows up with additional advice: “How about a walk in the park with a friend this afternoon? The local supermarket is offering 30% off fruits and vegetables for whoever reaches 80,000 steps in the ‘walk with a friend challenge’ this week.”
Although Mia and Jianing’s interaction don’t represent reality today, it is not difficult to imagine that in a not-so-distant future and with an ever-increasing set of technologies providing new ways to support healthy ageing, a digital Mia could be in most older adults’ pockets, providing them with real-time support.
The first step to achieve this vision is to overcome the digital divide faced by older people, which has been amplified during the COVID-19 pandemic. Bridging the digital divide is essential in enabling older people to participate in and contribute to society in today’s digitized world. The Healthy Ageing and the Innovation units at the office of the WHO Western Pacific Region (WPRO) are working together to promote digital inclusion for older people in the region.
Digital inclusion is increasingly recognized as a social determinant of health requiring a multi-sectorial approach to achieve. To promote best practices for the design and deployment of technologies, WPRO held a hybrid conference entitled “Digital inclusion of older people: harnessing digital technologies to promote healthy ageing in the Western Pacific Region” in Beijing in summer 2021. Stakeholders from across the region representing academia, government, and the private sector, shared their experiences and approaches for overcoming barriers and building age-friendly technologies.
Achieving this technological future also necessitates designing with older people, not just for them. AGATHA, an Avatar for Global Access to Technology for Healthy Ageing, co-developed by WHO WPRO with the China Academy of Information Communications Technology (CAICT), and implementing partners provides a versatile age-friendly platform for health promotion.
Older people were proactively engaged in discussions from the design stage. In fact, based on their feedback the original concept of AGATHA was changed from a chatbot with limited topics into a healthy ageing digital coach that educates older people through lessons and quizzes.
Figure 1: Older people are interacting with AGATHA in Focus Group Discussions with their mobile phone
Figure 2: Older people are interacting with AGATHA in Focus Group Discussions by using laptop
Figure 3: AGATHA, co-moderating with Dr Gauden Galea, WHO Representative for China at #72 Regional Committee for the Western Pacific Region
Digital technologies are one of the most powerful tools to enable leapfrogging to a healthy ageing society. Developing and leveraging technologies that promote health for older adults has both immediate and long-term benefits on health outcomes, health systems, society and the economy.
Older people are users, customers, innovators and social agents with diverse needs and preferences. They should be consulted at every step of the development process, while governments and the private sector advocate for inclusive technologies and promote an enabling environment for development and deployment.
For more information about AGATHA, please visit: https://ageing.caict.ac.cn.