ISISEMD evaluation framework for impact assessment of ICT pilot services for elderly with mild dementia, living in the community and their relatives

With the demographic changes and the ageing population in the most of theEuropean countries, currently we are witnessing emerging pilots with a differentscale of e-care services for elderly. Before further investment for widedeployment and uptake of ICT solutions in social care services, there is a needfor drawing a baseline for arriving at solid and comparable evidence to facilitatepolicy decisions. While general rating scales for measuring quality of life ofhealthy adults are relatively widely used, suitable indicators and methodologiesfor evaluation of improving quality of life for elderly with mild dementia livingin the community and their relatives using assistive technologies, are underdiscussions among researcher and social care providers who are involved inintroducing ICT services for these user groups. One of the challenges is how tobest measure the anticipated improved quality of life for the main user groupsand the socio-economic benefits for the care systems in a scientificallyacceptable way. To fill in this gap, ISISEMD project has worked towardsproposing overall evaluation framework to assess the impact of introducing ICTservices. This paper presents this framework with the suitable indictors,measurement methodologies and rating scales.assessment of ICT pilot services for elderly with milddementia, living in the community and their relatives. 2010 Networking and Electronic Commerce Research Conference in Riva del Garda, Italy. Publication: Research – peer review