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Sweden will have robotic caregivers
Last reviewed: 02.07.2025
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The Swedish University of Technology has developed a robotic nurse that can monitor a person's condition around the clock, bring food or medicine, and can also talk to the person under its care or call an ambulance if necessary.
The prototype of the robot was named Hobbit, and specialists from Sweden, Vienna and Greece worked on its creation, and the robot’s first ward will be an 89-year-old pensioner from Sweden.
The developers have calculated that the cost of the budget version of the robot will be within 12 thousand euros. The cost of models equipped with additional functions will reach 100 thousand euros. The main buyer of the new product may be a service providing home assistance to pensioners, which operates in Sweden.
The issue of care for pensioners in Sweden is very acute. According to statistics, in 2000, 22% of the country's residents were over 60 years old, and according to forecasts, by 2050 the share of the elderly population will reach almost 40%. With such figures, there may be a shortage of professionals to care for all those in need, and electronic nurses will help fill the gap.
Japanese engineers have long been leaders in the field of creating robot servants, as this country has a large percentage of elderly people. But engineers from Sweden have also been able to offer a number of worthy and original developments in this area.
A couple of years ago Stefan Von Ramp developed a care and communication system called Giraffe, which is constantly in touch with the person under its care anywhere, provided there is an internet connection (Swedish pensioners have no problems with this). If necessary, the system sends a request for help and a health worker is sent to the person. The cost of such a system is about 1.5 thousand euros, which is quite expensive by Swedish standards, however, such a system is cheaper than paying for a relative to stay in a nursing home.
Swedish specialists from Mälardalen University have also developed special gloves that help people with paralysis of the hands. Equipped with a special electric drive, the gloves help to take and carry small objects.
Last year, specialists from the same university created a robot in the form of a cat that can purr (the artificial sound is indistinguishable from the real one). Specialists claim that purring has a calming effect on a person. By the way, in the Finnish capital, in one of the nursing homes, artificial baby seals “live” that can make various sounds and respond to touch. Such robot seals were developed by specialists from Japan specifically to compensate for the lack of communication in elderly people living alone. Doctors claim that after “communication” with an artificial seal, the elderly person’s condition improves, both emotionally and physically. Japanese specialists called their robot therapeutic.
It is worth noting that artificial electronic animals are also bought by young healthy people who cannot have a live pet (due to allergies, lack of time for care, etc.).
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