Where’s the Humanity?

I met up with a colleague recently for a coffee and she was telling me that last month she attended an online conference centred around the care of the elderly.

Much to my colleague’s surprise there was a great deal of focus on robotic advances in elderly care. Meaning that in an aged care facility it will soon be feasible for a robot to see the residents each morning, to wake them up, see how they are feeling and perhaps give them medication. With advances like this in robotic technology there will be very little need for humans in aged care facilities at all.

This begs the question “Where is the Humanity?”

Is this what we have to look forward to in our old age? To end up in an Aged Care Facility being cared for by robots rather than people?

The elderly, in general, love being around people, interacting, talking, sharing life experiences, etc. How on earth are they going to get that kind of human to human contact from a robot?

Don’t get me wrong, there is a place for robots in the world, but I do not believe robots are what we want to see in our age care facilities, where we humans go to live out the final years of our lives. We want to feel cared for, nurtured and comfortable with familiar people around us. I can only imagine the fear a resident could experience seeing a robot coming into their room.

Can we also spare a thought for those poor residents who are working through the stages of dementia? Can we even begin to fathom what they would make of have a robot greeting them each day?

I believe this is another case of coming up with ideas that we “can do”, and not taking a moment to consider whether we “should”.

Kathrine Carton B.Coun.

kcartoncounselling.com.au