In the nineties, numerous studies began to highlight the problem of the increasing number of people with Alzheimer’s disease in developed countries, especially in the context of demographic progress. At the same time, the 21st century is typical of the development of advanced technologies that penetrate all areas of human life. Digital devices, sensors, and intelligent applications are tools that can help seniors and allow better communication and control of their caregivers. The aim of the paper is to provide an up-to-date summary of the use of technological solutions for improving health and safety for people with Alzheimer’s disease. Firstly, the problems and needs of senior citizens with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and their caregivers are specified. Secondly, a scoping review is performed regarding the technological solutions suggested to assist this specific group of patients. Works obtained from the following libraries are used in this scoping review: Web of Science, PubMed, Springer, ACM and IEEE Xplore. Four independent reviewers screened the identified records and selected relevant articles which were published in the period from 2007 to 2018. A total of 6,705 publications were selected. In all, 128 full papers were screened. Results obtained from the relevant studies were furthermore divided into the following categories according to the type and use of technologies: devices, processing, and activity recognition. The leading technological solution in the category of devices are wearables and ambient non-invasive sensors. The introduction and utilization of these technologies, however, bring about challenges in acceptability, durability, ease of use, communication, and power requirements. Furthermore, it needs to be pointed out that these technological solutions should be based on open standards.

Current views of sustainable development recognize the importance of accepting the Indigenous Knowledge (IK) of rural people. However, there is an increasing technological gap between Elder IK holders and the younger generation and a persistent incompatibility between IK and the values, logics and literacies embedded, and supported by ICT. Here, we present an evaluation of new technology that might bridge generations and preserve key elements of local IK in Namibia. We describe how we applied insights, generated by ethnographic, dialogical and participatory action research, in designing a structure in which users can store, organize and retrieve user-generated videos in ways that are compatible with their knowledge system. The structure embeds videos in a scenario-based 3D visualization of a rural village. It accounts for some of the ways this rural community manages information, socially, spatially and temporally and provides users with a recognizable 3D simulated environment in which to re-contextualize de-contextualized video clips. Our formative in situ evaluation of a prototype suggests the visualization is legible to community members, provokes participation in design discussions, offers opportunities for local appropriation and may facilitate knowledge sharing between IK holders and more youthful IK assimilators. Simultaneously differing interpretations of scenarios and modeled objects reveal the limitations of our modeling decisions and raises various questions regarding graphic design details and regional transferability.

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