Analytic Hierarchy Process to Define the Most Important Factors and Related Technologies for Empowering Elderly People in Taking an Active Role in their Health

Successful management of health conditions in older population is determined by strategic involvement of a professional team of careers and by empowering patients and their caregivers to take over a central role and responsibility in the daily management of condition. Identifying, structuring and ranking the most important needs related to these aspects could pave the way for improved strategies in designing systems and technological solutions supporting user empowerment. This paper presents the preliminary results of a study aiming to elicit these needs. Healthcare professionals, working together in the European and Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing (EIP-AHA) initiative, have defined a set of needs and factors that have been organized in two hierarchies around the concepts of patient activation and proactive and prepared care team, defined in the Chronic Care Model. The two hierarchies have been mapped, by a team of experts in computer science, with technologies and solutions that could facilitate the achievement of the identified needs.