Almost 10 million Europeans live with dementia or Parkinson’s disease today. As a result of ageing, the number of persons affected by one of those conditions is forecasted to double by 2030, making them major health challenges. Those persons want to live in their own homes but because of the symptoms they face difficulties in their daily life both in managing their own care and living independently.

The three-year project called ICT4Life, co-financed under Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation kicked-off in Madrid in January 2016 with the ambition to provide new services for integrated care employing user-friendly ICT tools, ultimately increasing patients’ quality of life and autonomy at home. Netis is part of the 9-member consortium, and will contribute to the project with software development, testing, system integration and eHealth knowledge.

To reach this goal, ICT4Life will conduct breakthrough research and radical innovation to implement the ICT4Life Platform. Such a platform will deliver a series of innovative services to patients affected by dementia or Parkinson but also to health professionals and formal and informal carers. All solutions will be developed following a user-centred methodology and tested in real life scenarios

This initiative brings together nine partners representing academia, industry and users’ groups, all committed in improving patients’ lives and advancing Europe’s leadership role in personalised services for integrated care.
The partners of this well-balanced and multidisciplinary consortium are namely: Artica Telemedicina (Spain), Polytechnic University of Madrid (Spain), Madrid Parkinson Association (Spain), Netis Informatics Ltd. (Hungary), E-seniors (France), Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (Greece), Maastricht University (The Netherlands), European Hospital and Healthcare Federation (Belgium) and the University of Pécs (Hungary). As a Hungarian SME, Netis considers its involvement in a leading edge international innovation project a huge achievement.

Alejandro Sánchez-Rico de las Heras, Director of eHealth at Artica Telemedicina and Project Coordinator stated “There are only few initiatives in the past that, employing user-friendly ICT tools, dealt so close with people with cognitive impairments at an early stage. However, most of the solutions proposed up to now for monitoring the older people at home rely on the detection of a limited set of risks, sending an alert only when a recognizable problem is identified”. Moreover, he added: “ICT4Life wants to shift from a reactive service delivery to a real proactive, preventive and patient-centred model of integrated care by enabling users’ education and empowerment”.