Lindy Clemson is Professor of Ageing and Occupational Therapy and director of the Ageing, Work & Health Research Unit at the Faculty of Health Sciences, The University of Sydney, an investigator on the Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research and an honorary Professor at Nottingham University. She is a recognised international leader in research on enablement and environmental approaches to falls prevention. In her research she has conducted nationally-funded trials to test the efficacy of interventions, including Stepping On, a group-based fall prevention program and the Lifestyle Functional Exercise (LiFE) program and has developed assessments related to environment and behavioural fall risk. Lindy has always ensured interventions are translation-ready with practical outputs. This translation work now extends to implementation research with engagement in nationally-funded Partnership Projects developing and examining implementation and sustainability of fall prevention activities at the population level. Lindy has published over 130 peer-reviewed journal articles. The impact of her work has extended to both policy and practice, and her publications and programs are highlighted in Cochrane reviews, the Australian and the US national fall prevention practice guidelines and in the US compendium of effective community-based falls prevention interventions.
Professor Lucy Yardley is Professor of Health Psychology at the University of Southampton and Director of the Centre for Applications of Health Psychology (CAHP). Currently her main research focus is on using the internet to support self-management of health. She pioneered the development of the unique ‘LifeGuide’ open source software for developing web-based intervention (www.lifeguideonline.org), and led the ‘UBhave’ programme to develop software for creating interventions for mobile phones (the ‘LifeGuide Toolbox’). Her current programme of research addresses key questions such as how to maximise engagement with digital interventions and how best to integrate digital support for self-management of health with existing health promotion and healthcare services. These questions are being addressed by the development and evaluation of numerous web-based healthcare interventions funded by over £30 million from the UK research councils, NIHR, medical charities and EC; these include interventions to support weight management, physical activity, reduction of infection transmission and antibiotic over-use, and self-management of numerous long-term health conditions (including cancer, hypertension, diabetes, back pain and dizziness). She has developed and applied the ‘person-based’ approach to using mixed methods for intervention development, resulting in very effective interventions published in the Lancet, BMJ and Annals of Internal Medicine. She has a longstanding interest in empowering people in the community to take control over their illness and treatment and is a core member of the NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) public health committee A.
Rolf Moe-Nilssen holds degrees in business administration and in physiotherapy and has served as professor at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Bergen, Norway. In a previous career he was manager of a publishing house where he initiated the first journal on exercise and physical activity in Norway. His research has had a focus on method evaluation, and he was one of the pioneers in developing and applying body worn sensors in the analysis of balance and gait. He was a partner and steering group member in the EU thematic network, ProFaNE, on falls prevention. He is frequently invited to serve as an opponent at PhD dissertations in Norway and abroad, and to give lectures on physical activity for groups and organisations of senior citizens. He has a personal interest in physical activity in general and in master’s sport in particular. In his present position as professor emeritus, he is supervising and gives PhD-courses at universities in Norway and Scandinavia.
Heidrun Mollenkopf is member of the BAGSO (The German National Association of Senior Citizens Organisations) Board of Experts and of the AGE (The European Older Peoples Platform) Universal Accessibility and Independent Living Expert Group.
Dr. med. Matthis Synofzik works at the Hertie Institute for Clinical Brain Research and German Research Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases, Tübingen, Germany.
Markus Thürsam – CTO of BOSCH Healthcare Solutions is responsible for the Engineering and Manufacturing departments. He joined BOSCH’s automotive section in 1990 after completing his studies in electronics. From 1998 – 2014 he was driving the activities of BOSCH in the area of assisted living for the elderly. He has been in his current position since 2015.
Dr. Jean-Claude Martin is the Deputy of CEO at Swatch Group Research and Development Ltd, div. Asulab.
Graduated in Electronics from The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology – Lausanne (EPFL) in 1991.
1991 – 1994 @ Swatch SA as Electronic Engineer and Project Manager for telecommunications products.
1994 – 2002 @ Asulab SA (former name of the central R&D Lab of Swatch Group) as Project Manager for integrating breakthrough technologies into electronic watches.
2002 – 2011 @ The Swatch Group R&D Ltd, as Head of Electronics Systems Group focusing on ultra-low power integrated circuits and embedded software. Since 2008 appointed Patents Manager of the company.
Since 2011, Deputy of CEO @ The Swatch Group R&D Ltd (central R&D Lab of Swatch Group).
The NTNU is a public research university with campuses in the cities of Trondheim, Gjøvik and Ålesund in Norway. NTNU is the largest of the eight universities in Norway and has the main national responsibility for higher education in engineering and technology. In addition to engineering and the natural and physical sciences, the university offers advanced degrees in other academic disciplines ranging from the social sciences, the arts, medicine and health sciences, teacher education, architecture and fine art.
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Almost 1000 years old, the University of Bologna (UNIBO) is known as the oldest University of the western world. Nowadays, UNIBO still remains one of the most important institutions of higher education across Europe and the second largest university in Italy with 11 Schools, 33 Departments and about 87.000 students; it is organized in a multi-campus structure with 5 operating sites (Bologna, Cesena, Forlì, Ravenna and Rimini), and, since 1998, also a permanent headquarters in Buenos Aires. With regard to the capability of attracting funding, UNIBO is very active both at National and European level. At European level, with 91Read More
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VU University Amsterdam founded in 1880, is a leading research university that ranks among the best in Europe. VU University Amsterdam employs many researchers who are among the best in their respective fields, at both national and international level, and for several years has been one of the leading academic research centers in Europe. The VU houses 12 faculties, 14 interdisciplinary research institutes, participates in two national research centers of excellence and is participant in 40 accredited research schools, of which 6 as coordinating institution. In total, the VU employs over 1,750 research FTE and yearly more than 6,650 academicRead More
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RBMF is the medical research department associated with the hospital of the German charity foundation “Robert Bosch Stiftung”. Research activities and teaching is attached to the Universities of Tuebingen (medical faculty and health psychology), Stuttgart (movement science, engineering, computer science) and Ulm (epidemiology). The members of the research team currently include 6 fulltime post‐doc positions and 15 research staff members in the areas of medical engineering, geriatric medicine, sport and movement science, health psychology, epidemiology, gerontology, and physiotherapy. R&D activities include different fields of geriatric medicine. The department is currently running several RCTs with complex interventions focusing on physical activityRead More
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The University of Manchester (UMAN) is one of the world’s top 50 universities. Research is at the heart of the University, no fewer than 20 former staff and students have gone on to be Nobel laureates and the university currently has 4 Nobel laureates as members of the academic staff. The University has over 1,800 staff active in research and over £190m of funding for research earned each year. The University participated in participated in 380+ FP7 projects and coordinated 39. The University has also hosted 33 ERC grants and 27 Marie Curie Initial Training Networks. The University is currentlyRead More
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LHTC (Local Health Unit Tuscany Centre) is the new health unit born on 1 January 2016 from a merger of four previous Tuscan local health unit settled in Firenze, Prato, Empoli e Pistoia. This important reorganization has been decided on regional level to reduce the 12 Local Health Units in Tuscany to only 3: one (LHTC) for Tuscany Centre zone, and the other two for North West Tuscany and for South West Tuscany zone. This organization change has been decided to optimize the economic resources, to erase the duplication of bureaucratic and administrative systems, to make similar: health activities, systemsRead More
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The “École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne” (EPFL) is one of the two Swiss Federal Polytechnical Schools (http://www.epfl.ch). With more than 350 laboratories and research groups on campus, EPFL is one of the Europe’s most innovative and productive technology institutes and is also renowned for the quality of its teaching and training programmes. In 2013 the Shanghai Jiao Tong ranking placed EPFL second in Europe and 15th worldwide in Engineering/Technology and Computer sciences, and many other global comparisons place it among the top European universities. EPFL was rightly recognized as “one of the world’s most cosmopolitan universities” by the Times HigherRead More
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Doxee is a leading global technology and services provider of enterprise-class, cloud-based CCM, with offices in Europe and North America. Over 500 enterprises in banking, finance, telecom, insurance, healthcare, utilities and public sectors employ Doxee solutions to deliver personalized and interactive customer communications to their clients. Doxee customers process over 2 billion documents every year reaching over 100 million end users across the globe.
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Health Leads BV is a consultancy company based in Bussum, the Netherlands that focuses on healthcare innovation and digital transformation including on the improvement of communication in healthcare by bridging online and offline aspects. Bringing healthcare technology to the market and to the end-user is the main objective. In all its activities Health Leads keeps a strong view on the end-user and the human side of healthcare innovation. Health Leads is focused on the creation and realisation of market uptake of meaningful and effective digital health care innovations.
Meet the People >This project has received 4 million euro funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 689238 as well as a 600.000 euro grant from the Swiss government.
Over the three-year project period, PreventIT developed and tested two lifestyle-integrated exercise intervention programmes to prevent future functional decline in adults aged 61-70 years: the paper-based, instructor-led aLiFE and the app-based eLiFE. A motivational strategy was developed to support behavioural change towards a more active, healthy lifestyle. In addition, several tools were developed to screen the risk for future functional decline, personalise the intervention to individual users, assess behavioural complexity, and allow users to test their own function unsupervised. Results from the feasibility study indicated that the developed interventions were feasible and safe, with good intervention uptake and acceptable adherence. Participants were aware that the technology was not fully developed, but they liked the concept of lifestyle-integrated activities, managed to change their daily routines towards increased activity, and were positive about the proof-of-concept technologies integrated in the app-based eLiFE.
Prevention of disease and disability starts with a healthy lifestyle, and the one factor typically heralded for both its preventive and rehabilitative power is physical activity. But despite extensive knowledge about the importance of an active lifestyle for our overall health and function, two-thirds of the population is less active than recommended and particularly retirement is a period in which activity levels drop further. Technology can be used to activate and motivate people, and is especially powerful when tailored to an individual’s needs, challenges, and barriers. In addition, technology can help people to take responsibility for their own health and function from a very early stage onwards, before gradual age-related decline in underlying functions manifest themselves as growing difficulties performing activities in daily life.
PreventIT sees modern developments in mobile technology as an excellent starting point to enable active and healthy ageing, and therefore aims to develop a personalised behavioural change intervention at the time of retirement that is based on exercises and activities that are embedded into daily life. In order to realize this ambitious aim, PreventIT brings together a strong consortium with partners from several European research institutions, academic hospitals, and companies that together have the necessary skills and experience to bring this project to fruition.
The main aim of the project is to develop and test a personalized ICT based intervention aimed at behavioral change in people who have recently retired, in order to decrease risk for age-related functional decline. We will target the consumer market, and not the health care system. The intervention consists of small bouts of exercise integrated in daily life, where wearable sensors (a smartphone and a wrist watch) are used to give feedback on physical behavior, motivate for further activity, and socialize with others. The main outcome from the study is a complexity metrics for physical behavior derived from monitoring of physical activity and sleep by use of body worn sensors. A cloud based platform will be established to communicate and store information of the sensing systems. User interfaces aimed at older people will be developed. Motivation for exercise, usability of ICT solutions, use of unobtrusive technology, and data protection will be paid particular attention. The project also aims to develop tools for monitoring and assessing physical behavior, using data from body worn sensor systems.