14 July 2015
Bilbao Campus
“We want to implement a new way of working that involves both people with disabilities and the professionals that assist them”, stated Ana Berástegui, Director of the Chair in Family and Disability:Teléfonica- Repsol-Down Madrid; Foundation, said at the opening session of the workshop “Low-cost robots and disabilities”, organised by the Chair and the Technology Research Institute (ITT), set within the framework of the Campus of International Excellence Aristos Campus Mundus.
The aim of this workshop was to discuss the applications of low-cost robots to serve these groups of people and, particularly, to facilitate contact between potential users, the professionals working with them, and the researchers responsible for their development at the Universities of Deusto, Comillas and Ramon Llull.
Álvaro Sánchez Miralles, IIT researcher, explained that the university is trying to open up a new work focus in this area, improving the technical aspect and interaction between users and technological applications. The application in question enables communication and interaction between the user, the robot, a mobile device and the therapist. The next steps in this research, although still in its initial stages, are to determine the stakeholders, create specific activities for each of these groups, recruit patients and make an initial assessment.
Sánchez Miralles, Estefanía Zulaica and Zhiyin Lou, from IIT, presented the application they are developing; Begoña García Zapirain and Leire López, from Deusto, gave a demonstration of the robot they use to accompany people over 65 in their therapies, and Alex Barco, from Ramon Llull, briefly outlined the findings in working with children who have suffered head injuries.
Researchers and potential users then worked in groups on various robotic applications in the field of disability.
