A Health Monitoring Application to Support Informal Caregivers of People with Cognitive Impairment

Abstract

Informal caregivers of people with cognitive impairment are often concerned about the health and wellbeing of their loved ones, leading to frequent care-related visits, check-ups, and conversations. Results from focus groups we held in daily care showed a strong need for support in terms of information about the health and wellbeing of the person with cognitive impairment (PwCI). The health monitoring application developed in this study, called HELMA, aims to offer a solution by monitoring the health and wellbeing of the PwCI in the long term and informing the informal caregivers. HELMA is an eHealth application that uses short frequent online monitoring questions to provide informal caregivers with information about the following health and wellbeing domains: physical; mental; social; and environmental. The next step is to evaluate HELMA on a large scale with end-users in daily practice.