FW-HTF-P: The Future Matrix of Care: Communities, Networks, and Technologies

护理工作是现代社会的支柱。在适当的时间和适当的地点提供护理，对于儿童、老年人、残疾人和处理健康问题的个人的福利和福祉至关重要。由于人口结构的变化，越来越多的美国家庭将有孩子和年迈的父母，以及其他有各种健康状况的人，他们需要照顾和支持。目前的护理模式将无法提供这种支持，因为它分散在各种环境和提供者之间，如养老院、医院、日托机构以及老年和儿童护理设施。这种支离破碎反过来又会引起过渡和护理的连续性问题，产生难以克服的财政和社会成本。为了克服这些问题，该项目提出了“关怀的矩阵”，作为一种基于社区、社会嵌入和互动的关怀模式，使用基于对关怀工作的新理解的智能技术。建议的矩阵将在提供护理和医疗服务方面改变未来工作的格局。作为这一方向的第一步，调查人员建议将护理工作不仅仅视为在专业环境中发生的事情，而是更广泛地认为任何旨在改善和丰富个人、家庭和社区的健康、福祉和生活质量的活动，而不考虑背景。这包括家务(如清洁、做饭)、购物、情感支持、帮助穿衣和个人卫生、吃饭、搬运、行政任务(如支付账单、报税)、安全出行和洗衣服。由此产生的护理矩阵将跨越规模(个人、家庭、组织、社区、城市)和各种维度，包括不同的护理提供环境(家庭、设施、医院等)。适用于不同环境(城市、农村、郊区)的多代人(儿童、成人、老年人)。调查人员还建议，将护理者视为参与提供护理的任何人，而不仅仅是有偿的专业人员。这将涉及专业护理人员(护士、医生、治疗师、教练等)。也包括直系亲属和大家庭、邻居和社区的其他成员。在此基础上，该项目将采取多管齐下的方法，主要内容如下：(I)培训、提升和监管专业护理员；(Ii)机构和政府对家庭和社区护理的支持；(Iii)提供能够在护理者及其家庭与各种新技术之间发挥整合作用的有技能的个人。这些技术将包括辅助机器人感知附着在个人身上或分布在环境中的设备；特定领域和特定条件的应用；交通基础设施；远程医疗、远程医疗和远程医疗平台；以及认知增强系统，如游戏。该项目将开发几个案例研究，将在印第安纳州布鲁明顿市进行，作为试验拟议的护理矩阵的试验台。该项目的最终目标是发展必要的研究人员、研究基础设施和基础工作，以在FW-HTF全面研究计划的层面上扩大研究未来技术、未来工人和未来工作的机会。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Care work is a mainstay of modern societies. The provision of care at the right time and the right place is crucial for the welfare and wellbeing of children, the elderly, the disabled, and individuals dealing with health issues. Because of the changing demographics, more and more American households will have both children and aging parents, as well as other individuals with various health conditions, who need care and support. The current model of care is not going to be able to provide this support because it is fragmented between various settings and providers such as nursing homes, hospitals, daycares, and senior- and childcare facilities. This fragmentation, in turn, gives rise to issues of transition and continuity of care, generating insurmountable financial and social costs. To overcome these issues, this project proposes 'the matrix of care' as a community-based, socially embedded, and interactive model of care using intelligent technologies based on a new understanding of care work. The proposed matrix will transform the landscape of the Future of Work in the provision of care and medical services.As a first step in this direction, the investigators propose to think of care work not solely as what happens in professional settings, but more broadly as any activity that aims to improve and enrich the health, wellbeing, and quality of life of individuals, families, and communities, regardless of context. This includes, among other things, housekeeping (e.g. cleaning, cooking), shopping, emotional support, help with dressing and personal hygiene, eating, lifting, administrative tasks (e.g. paying bills, filing taxes), safely getting around, and doing laundry. The resulting matrix of care will span across scales (individual, household, organization, community, city) and various dimensions, including different settings of care delivery (homes, facilities, hospitals, etc.) for multiple generations (children, adults, older adults) in different environments (urban, rural, suburban). The investigators also propose to think of caregivers not solely in terms of paid professional workers but as anyone who is involved in the delivery of care. This would involve professional caregivers (nurses, doctors, therapists, coaches, etc.) but also immediate and extended family, neighbors, and other members of the community. On this basis, the project will pursue a multi-pronged approach with the following key components: (i) the training, promotion, and regulation of professional caregivers; (ii) institutional and government support for family and community care; (iii) the provision of skilled individuals who can act as integrators at the interface between cared-for individuals, their families, and various new technologies. Such technologies will include assistive robots sensing devices attached to individuals or distributed in the environments; domain- and condition-specific applications; transportation infrastructures; telehealth, telerehab, and telemedicine platforms; and cognitive augmentation systems such as games. The project will develop several case studies to be carried out in the city of Bloomington, Indiana, as a testbed for experimenting with the proposed matrix of care. The ultimate goal of this project is to develop the necessary research personnel, research infrastructure, and foundational work to expand the opportunities for studying future technology, future workers, and future work at the level of a FW-HTF full research proposal.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.