An Open Architecture to Support Social and Health Services in a Smart TV Environment

Objective: To design, implement, and test a solution to provide social and health services for the elderly at home based on smart TV technologies and access to all services. Methods: The architecture proposed is based on an open software platform and standard personal computing hardware. This provides great flexibility to develop new applications over the underlying infrastructure or to integrate new devices, for instance to monitor a broad range of vital signs in those cases where home monitoring is required. Results: An actual system as a proof-of-concept was designed, implemented, and deployed. Applications range from social network clients to vital signs monitoring; from interactive TV contests to conventional online care applications such as medication reminders or telemedicine. Conclusion: In both cases, the results have been very positive, confirming the initial perception of the TV as a convenient, easy-to-use technology to provide social and health care. The TV set is a much more familiar computing interface for most senior users, and as a consequence, smart TVs become a most convenient solution for the design and implementation of applications and services targeted to this user group. Significance: This proposal has been tested in real setting with 62 senior people at their homes. Users included both individuals with experience using computers and others reluctant to them.