BRAINSTORMING

We spent more than 12 hours out of 36 hours in brainstorming. Based on team's previous experience, we understood that problem areas related to older adults could be classified into three categories - Social Connectedness, Health & Wellness & Safety. 

After multiple passes of divergence-convergence brainstorm cycles, the team came up with potential directions by identifying key problems under each categories. After analyzing all the initial directions, we realized that in terms of safety, a lot has been already done. However, majority of the products are curative in nature rather than being preventive. For example a wearable device that send SOS when an older adults has fallen or a SOS button installed near the floor of the bathroom, to enable older adults send out SOS when they have fallen. 

The team recognized the lack of preventive measures and products as a huge opportunity to base our concept on.

We started listing the major hazards around the house such as falls due to slipping or tripping, fire due to unattended electrical appliances or stove, water damage due to unattended bathroom, spike in electricity consumption due to unattended television and appliances or cuts while preparing food. 

We also found that forgetfulness may cause older adults to lose their sense of independence. They may experience:

    + Judgement from others                               +  Embarrassment                           + Loss of self-confidence

CONNECTING THE DOTS

We observed that forgetfulness is the major underlying cause behind a lot of these hazards. We did a brief literature review to support our assumption. We found some major indicators in support of our hypothesis.

Leaving an un-attneded stove or oven is not limited to older adults. It is an event that all of us have done at some point of our life. This becomes potentially more common and more dangerous with the added affects of forgetfulness among the older adults. We picked fire caused due to forgetfulness and through kitchen related appliances as a Used-case scenario. 

PERSONA DEVELOPMENT

As the first step in designing a system, we established personas for the Used-case scenario.

CONCEPTUALIZATION

The process started with ideation and prototyping with the available resources during the hackfest. As 

SYSTEM LEVEL DESIGN

The key to the successful implementation of such a solution is in the system level design. 

Key Assumption: As part of the brainstorming session, we debated about the system level perspective of the design. Based on the experience and knowledge about the existing smart-home solutions, we decided to build our solution on top of the existing smart-home set up available in the market. 

Google Nest or Amazon Echo are few good examples for such a system, where information from different parts of the house is integrated through smart-devices to a central hub. 

THE SOLUTION

The following video is one of the initial iterations which outlines the overall design of the product. This will be replaced with the latest version of the solution soon!

WORK IN PROGRESS