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Where are those robots?
May 9, 2008
There are roughly 78 million baby boomers in the U.S. and about 8,000 of them turn 60 every day. A small number still have parents, many of whom are in continuing care retirement facilities, which many of the baby boomers themselves will have need of in the future. A number of studies have revealed that, under current situations, there won’t be enough health care workers available in the future to properly take care of the residents in these facilities.
One of the solutions noted was the implementation of robotic systems for many of the routine chores, thereby freeing up the available health care providers to do the more personal and intensive jobs. Other robotic systems have been demonstrated for the in-home care and monitoring of elderly citizens. Health care robotic assistants’ duties include systems for delivery and disposal of materials, infirm patient guidance and tracking, rehabilitation assistants, and overall monitoring and analysis. But while many of these systems have been demonstrated, relatively few have been transitioned into actual products and integrated into health care facilities or available for in-home use.
Likely, the overall costs for the systems including their initial acquisition, maintenance, and monitoring and control networks are still beyond the payback range required by the care facility operators or individuals. Their reliability, especially in power outage situations, also has not been proven. Certainly, the looming volume of potential customers for these products is highly visible and without question, so as to create a marketplace with adequate revenue possibilities and high-volume cost reductions. Regardless, the manufacturers of such systems are not visibly increasing, and the integrations of systems into facilities is meager at best. Indeed, research in robotic health care appears to be increasing in the EU and Japan—who have their own rising levels of senior citizens—faster than it is in the U.S.
Is this going to become a situation where robotic systems needed to take care of our elderly are sourced from suppliers outside the U.S.? These are primarily high-technology products and not commodities, so that the cost advantage for foreign suppliers should not be an issue. It will become primarily a situation of who actually designs and builds these systems and offers them for sale. I sincerely hope that U.S. industry will take advantage of this opportunity to create a new market sector.
