Elderly individuals and injured people are using robots as home care support to help them navigate their homes

(SeaPRwire) –   Following the passing of their second service dog, Booker T. Bones, Brenda and Brian Marquis continued to require assistance with challenging daily tasks.

Their solution was Robbie, a robot that emerges from a hallway into their living space multiple times daily.

“Do you want to exercise now? Please answer yes or no,” inquires the caregiving robot of 59-year-old Brian Marquis, who has lived with a traumatic brain injury since a 2012 automobile accident.

“Yes,” he replies. He then rises as the robot’s digital screen, featuring googly eyes as a “face,” transitions into an exercise video that leads him through a workout.

The long-standing ambition to create helpful and realistic home robots, inspired by fictional characters like Rosie the robotic maid from The Jetsons, remains largely unfulfilled. This is the case even as demand grows, with the oldest baby boomers reaching 80 and the U.S. confronting an escalating shortage of in-home care aides due to low pay, high staff turnover, and strenuous work.

However, the machine assisting the Marquis family—a robot operated by a University of New Hampshire lab and funded by the National Institute on Aging—reveals a view of the potential future.

‘Stretch’ assists a dementia patient with various duties

The wheeled robot, which some compare to a coat rack, was not what Brenda Marquis originally envisioned when she emailed a nearby UNH robotics professor seeking guidance on robotic dogs.

Robbie, the couple’s nickname for a new model officially named Stretch 4, remains at a charging station between the kitchen and bedroom for much of the day. When active, it performs crucial functions, such as prompting Brian, who has dementia, to eat lunch or hydrate.

Brenda Marquis, 59, stated that both she and her husband have physical, cognitive, and emotional impairments that complicate their lives.

“We’ve been somewhat stuck with the issue in New Hampshire of finding and hiring sufficient home care support,” Brenda Marquis explained during an interview at the couple’s Durham, New Hampshire apartment, where she navigates in a motorized wheelchair while caring for her husband. “That’s when I began researching robotics and attempting to determine a solution.”

The recipient of Brenda’s email was Momotaz Begum, a UNH computer science professor who has researched “socially assistive” robots for years to help those with Alzheimer’s or other dementias. Her lab contains numerous experimental robots, including those with four legs.

Begum mentioned that the lab consulted focus groups of older adults in memory care facilities about their preferred robot companion. Many favored designs resembling pets.

“The frequent comment we received about Stretch was, ‘Okay, this one resembles a coat hanger,'” she noted. “But we discovered over time that appearance is not important.”

Multiple companies are creating robots for senior companionship

Beyond robotic vacuums, the nearest equivalent many seniors have to a caregiving robot is a speaker with an AI voice assistant like Alexa. Some manufacturers have developed this idea into rotating tabletop devices such as ElliQ, intended for elder companionship.

Yet these lack sufficient mobility or functionality for Begum, who stated she is “aiming to lessen the caregiver’s load. And a caregiver performs far more than just providing social interaction.”

Humanoid robots, meanwhile, remain largely impractical for most households and could physically endanger individuals with limited mobility if the robot were to stumble and collapse.

The creators of Hello Robot, the company behind the Stretch robots, emphasized that its simplicity is key.

“Our robot is very practical and pragmatic. I believe it conveys that,” said CEO Aaron Edsinger, a former Google robotics director. “If you appear as a humanoid, expectations will be set so high it will be extremely difficult to meet them.”

The standard Stretch 4 model has a telescoping gripper capable of fetching a water bottle and offering it for someone to drink through a straw. It can also assist in reading the small print on a prescription bottle. The robot integrates data from its own cameras and sensors, along with other sensors placed in the home, to determine its position and identify occupants in a room.

Produced at Hello Robot’s Martinez, California headquarters and priced at nearly $30,000, the new model released in May is not yet as common as a Roomba or an AI speaker. For its intended users, however, it can be vital.

Robbie’s programmed care schedule for Brian is displayed on the couple’s wall, featuring exercise guidance, reminders for meals and medication, prompts for evening routines, and quick hygiene cues that activate only after Brian enters the bathroom.

“I was never interested in technology,” Brian Marquis said. “Then I understood I couldn’t remember to wash my face and underarms. So, it almost felt like it liberated me.”

Brenda Marquis added that it also saved her hours of daily labor and reduced costs. Previously anxious about leaving her husband alone for extended periods, she used Instacart for groceries. Now she can leave him with Robbie and shop for groceries independently.

“I can go ahead to that mahjong game or something else. Robbie will look after him,” she said.

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AP journalist Rodrique Ngowi contributed to this report.