ATHENE: Assistive Technologies for Healthy living in Elders: Needs assessment by Ethnography

Numerous assistive technologies to support independent living – including personal alarms, mobile phones, self-monitoring devices, mobility aids, software apps and home adaptations – have been developed over the years, but their uptake by older people, especially those from minority ethnic groups, is poor. This paper outlines the ways in which the ATHENE project seeks to redress this situation by producing a richer understanding of the complex and diverse living experiences and care needs of older people and exploring how industry, the NHS, social services and third sector can work with the older people themselves to ‘co-produce’ useful and useable ALT designs to meet their needs. In this paper, we provide an overview of the project methodology and discuss some of the issues it raises for the design and development process.