The Use of Cobots for Disabled and Older Adults

Collaborative robots, also known as Cobots, were originally designed to assists humans in industrial applications. Unlike conventional robots, cobots are designed to operate with humans, rather than replace them. This paper presents a different type of application of cobots that require the interaction with caregivers/nurses of older population, in particular people that cannot move freely in bed. The study examines the possibility of integrating cobots to assist caregivers/nurses in the service of this incapacitated population. The study provides a framework and methods for changing the position of inactive patients in bed to avoid pressure wounds. The research focuses on developing operational tools and analyzing the kinematic and dynamic capabilities of the cobots using dummy puppets in a laboratory environment. Various operational patterns were examined including robot-robot and human-robot configurations, on-line identification of the patient's position and robot-robot and human-robot interfaces. In all type of patterns, the contact forces and torques were recorded along the entire process. The major conclusion from this study is that, although cobots can perform the entire process autonomously, a better performance is achieved by cooperation with human caregiver/nurse. The results of this study can be extended to the general integration of cobots in industrial environments.