A new trial in Aarhus has shown that playing games with a South Korean robot can delay the development of dementia among the elderly.
The robot, named Sille, is the property of DemensHjørnet – an Aarhus Municipality initiative to help citizens showing signs of the onset of dementia – and it can be used to train memory and language skills. So far, the results have been encouraging.
“We can see that the citizens who have trained with Sille perform better than the control group when it comes to memory and the ability to get an overview of things,” Michelle Nielsen, the head of the project, told Metroxpress newspaper.
“Our experience is that training with the robot can curtail the development of dementia. The elderly see the robot as a team player and not an authority, which would be the case if they were playing with an employee.”
READ MORE: Dementia in Denmark: looking for solutions to a growing problem
Aarhus showing the way
The elderly can play 16 different games with the robot, including games designed to train memory through word pairing and numbers.
As of now, Aarhus is the only municipality in Denmark that uses a robot to help people struggling with the onset of dementia.
