Design of a Supportive Transfer Robot System for Caregivers to Reduce Physical Strain During Nursing Activities.

Abstract

The number of people in need of long-term care is rising and personnel scarcity is already foreseeable. The shortage of caregivers is further increased due to early retirement attributed to the major health burden when working at high speed with heavy lifting. Since nursing staff in many cases work beyond their physical strain limits during routine activities at the bed and existing systems do not counteract the current trend, we investigate with the present work whether the concept of a collaborative robotic support system can contribute to the physical relief of the nursing staff to make it possible to fall below the physical strain limits.