ABSTRACT
The number of dementia patients that need inpatient hospital care is growing. The unfamiliar environment, strangers, high noise level and the hectic of hospital routine have a negative impact on the patient’s cognitive status resulting in “challenging behavior”. Dementia patients need additional and specialized care but high workload and limited personnel resources prevent staff to respond adequately to the patient’s special needs. Assistive technology might help to address the special needs of dementia patients without increasing the workload of the medical staff. For its successful application a holistic approach to ensure ergonomic quality is necessary. The objective of the present contribution is to introduce such a holistic approach and to illustrate its application during a case study. The results show that the presented approach is suitable for integrating ergonomic principles into the development process of assistive technology. Further development of the approach, i.e. identification and evaluation of suitable methods, is planned and in progress.
