Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) at the ‘New Home’ project
The ‘New Home’ project in Czechia is a great example of family-type housing for adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). It responds to the individual needs of the residents, facilitates the work of staff and ensures energy-efficient operation. All of this was helped by the project’s Loxone smart system, which provides the Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) features. The installation here was done by Smarteon Systems – a Loxone Flagship Partner in Czechia.
The home grows with its residents
The mission of ‘New Home‘ is to provide the residents with autism, an as independent life as possible. Allowing them to have freedom, and be able to care for themselves and their household (with the necessary level of support as and when they need it). This is helped by:
- Door & Window Contacts – Detecting their opening and through the speakers a notification is played for the care assistant about the resident’s movement.
- Automatic lighting – Works based on presence and eliminates the need for buttons.
- Automatic blinds – Each resident’s rooms blinds are individually controlled based on the time they get up, according to their habits.
- Intelligent audio – It also serves as an alarm, which replaces the annoying alarm sound in an emergency with a song that the residents are used to. Otherwise, the residents might experience stress that may cause them not to want to leave their rooms in a dangerous situation (fire, flooding, etc.). The song will call everyone to come to a pre-learned place to meet.
- Water Sensors – They are set up so that the care assistant is only called when there is a flood and not just water from playing in the sink for example.
- Button Air – Emergency button in the toilets for calling the care assistant.
- And much more…
Working in a more enjoyable and more efficient way to prevent burnout
The ‘New Home’ has a team of 14 care assistants, which allows the residents to have freedom but also ensures their safety. The care assistants don’t have to be on edge and alert 24/7 and check on residents constantly because of the Loxone AAL system that has been installed here as it will notify them if they are needed. For example, they don’t have to check in the rooms at night, as if the occupancy sensor detects more than 15 seconds of movement in one, the night care assistant will be notified. All of these AAL systems, powered by Loxone, eliminates a variety of challenging situations.
The ‘New Home’ team can keep a track of what is going on in the house through one mobile app, no matter where they are. It also records employee attendance through the access system – based on information from the NFC Code Touch keypad at the entrance – through the workers presenting their NFC key fob when arriving.
Making the most of the investors and organisations money through energy efficiency
Raising funds for such projects, like the ‘New Home’, is not an easy task. However, it is often a bit easier to raise initial funds for the start-up investment versus subsequent ongoing operational costs. While Loxone has meant that the ‘New Home’ has made a slightly higher initial investment, this investment will pay for itself within the first year of operation at the reduced operational cost because of the Loxone system. But how?
- Through Intelligent Energy Management – the Loxone App provides visualisation of PV production, energy consumption and energy flows in the building, through statistics and graphs. The system monitors appliances and can trigger them based on energy priorities and current solar PV production.
- Saving on wages – With the Loxone system, the home now only needs one care assistant for the night shifts thanks to the technology taking tasks of the staffs hands. This saves hundreds of thousands of crowns per year on wages.
Loxone allows you to change the setup of the building to suit the needs of residents and staff. Thus, a single system can not only deliver the necessary assisted living features to a community service, but replace other single-purpose systems and applications that would need to be purchased. This has to be taken into account in the design phase.
I Like It Here.
The project ‘New Home’, a home for people with disabilities, was built by the non-profit organization ‘I Like It Here’. Its mission is to improve the quality of life for people with autism and their families. Through outreach, it seeks to build a welcoming environment that will allow for the development of year-round, family-based residential services for people on the autism spectrum.
Support the ‘New Home’ project:
Smarteon Systems
The New Home Loxone project was designed, engineered and installed by experts from Smarteon Systems in Brno, Czechia. The company is behind many successful projects that have earned it the title of Loxone Flagship Partner over the years. The company focuses on various types of projects including commercial buildings, special applications and assisted living.
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