Professor Henrik Hautop Lund from DTU recently got nominated because of his input in the development of Moto Tiles for eldercare while working for Center for Playware.
The professor, who works in the Center for Playware, a part of DTU, got nominated in three different categories of awards, which is referred to as ‘the Oscars for eldercare industry’. The same awards, also known as the Asia Pacific Eldercare Innovation Award are among the most prestigious, if not the most prestigious in the eldercare industry. They acknowledge the best minds through their contributions to the production and delivery of eldercare products.
Professor Henrik Hautop Lund was quoted as saying:
“It is an great honour to observe around the globe how our research and development of Playware technology from DTU, in the form of the Moto Tiles, has such a profound, positive influence on people’s lives, allowing elderly to regain both cognitive and physical skills.”
Moto Tiles is a form of exercise which helps in rehabilitation. It is designed to help the elderly citizens take a break from the grindingly monotonous training programs, and ushers them into the participation of an exercise which provides more fun and excitement than others. According to the producers, the focus is deflected from just staying fit to having fun, which makes it more motivating. The tiles are like interactive LEGO bricks which encourages physical interaction between the elderly and the tile. They can be arranged and rearranged in order to create a path or surface on the floor. There are blue, red, green, yellow or purple light which comes on from each tile, an encouragement to interaction and physical play.
The design of the tiles is to activate and motivate the elderly using a wide range of different games. These games can be easily selected and controlled using a tablet.
Some qualitative studies result came back with the fact that therapists and the elderly get fun and motivation from training with Moto Tiles. Other scientific clinical effect studies taken at DTU show that there has been a large effect bordering on the functional abilities of patients because of training with the Moto tiles. This is backed up by cognitive tests by Hitachi which show the effects training with Moto Tiles have on the brain. It has been observed that spending less time with these training sessions as opposed to spending a long time with the traditional training methods provides significant effects. Rehabilitation centers, senior activity center, care homes and a lot more, have started making use of the Moto Tiles.
Moto Tiles is the only innovation which has been nominated in this many categories. It has been nominated for the main category of the Innovation of the Year, listed in the category of Best Dementia Care Programme, and has also been listed for the category of Best Product to Support Ageing-In-Place. The award gala for the Oscars of the eldercare industry is slated to take place on 16th May, 2018, at Marina Bay Sands, Singapore
