Telecare robotic system for support of elderly and disabled people

Abstract

This paper describes the concept of telecare robotic system for support of elderly and disabled people using CORBA as communication architecture. The paper also details the architecture and key technologies of implementation of the system. The proposed system gives the care receivers the ability to operate the robotic systems to supply some basic daily services. Human care-givers in management center can manage the control user and control rights of robots, do supervisory control to support the local user, and monitor the state of robot working and the aged or disabled staying alone at home or small-scale distributed facilities by video feedback. Using CORBA as a communication architecture, we developed hardware base, user management server, task-level robot arm control server, live image feedback server, mobile robot control server and iGPS server, which can provide some basic care services to aid the aged and disabled. The developed system has the potential to improve the QoL of the aged or disabled and care cost in the future population-aging society.