The AI4HomeCare consortium members will be participating in a policy session at an upcoming 18th AAATE Conference “Technology for Inclusion and Participation for All: Recent Achievements and Future Directions” in Nikosia, 10-12 September 2025.
The session, titled “Empowering care and support networks in the digital era” on long term care, will focus on the role of digital technology, skills development, and investment in home care. During the event, the consortium will share insights from the AI4HomeCare project.
In Europe long term care and support to those that need it, is often provided by care ecosystems of formal and informal caregivers. To make, or keep, care and support effective, efficient, affordable and of high quality, politicians and policymakers at all levels have put their trust in the role of person-centred digital technology in home care settings. However, the adoption of technology in long term care and support depends on many critical factors that need attention, such as the (digital) competences of formal and informal care givers, the selection process leading to the choice for the most appropriate solutions, the availability or not of support for specific users and user groups, recognising differences and communalities between them, the expectations, motivations and fears of stakeholders (e.g. data protection, dehumanisation, security of Artificial Intelligence). European, national and local governments could, and probably should, do more to facilitate the adoption of technology in care and support networks in order to meet the aforementioned high level objectives.
In the session we will discuss the need for investments in the skills development of formal care workers (e.g. professionals) and informal carers. Starting from European initiatives such as the Digital skills agenda, the Pact for Skills, the Sector skills Alliance and European projects such as Care4skills and AI4HomeCare, we will discuss what national, regional and local governments, as well as service providers could do more to respond to information, training and organisational needs of stakeholders in order to facilitate the uptake of digital solutions in care and support services and in home care.
Programme of the session inculdes:
- Welcome and introduction: Evert-Jan Hoogerwerf (AAATE)
- Empowering care and support ecosystems in long term care through knowledge and skills development. A European perspective: Alessia Sebillo (EASPD)
- Technology enabled innovation in care and support services: Riccardo Magni (Pragma Engineering)
- Training needs of professionals in long term care: results from the Care4Skills project: Melanie Schaur (JKU)
- Information and training needs of informal caregivers: results from the AI4HomeCare project: Nikoletta Geronikola (Alzheimer Athens) and Aldona Okraszewska (Fundacja Małopolska Izba Samorządowa)
- Panel discussion chaired by Evert-Jan Hoogerwerf (AAATE)
More about the AAATE conference:
https://www.conftool.org/aaate2025/sessions.php
