ABSTRACT

The aging of the population worldwide implies anincrease in the number of cognitive impairment associateddiseases in the elderly. On the other hand, the number ofinformal caregivers is decreasing and consequently, we mustguarantee the existence of enough social and health services forall the population in the immediate future. The new technologiesallow us the development of more advanced instruments forgerontological intervention for both patients and caregivers. Thesenew systems help to prevent the lack of home assistance, andthanks to the Internet connection, we avoid the disadvantages ofthe geographic dispersion of the population. In this article, wedescribe Telegerontology®, a new home attention tool for patientsand caregivers. It integrates different functionalities related tophysical, cognitive and medical intervention it works like a familysupport thanks to the professionals/patients communication, andintegrates an advanced emergency system within a domoticenvironment. This system improves the traditional telecare sinceit, actually, has more sophisticated services and a higher qualityof home support.