Organised by: Centre for Enabled Living (CEL) and the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA)
The event
One in 12 Singapore residents is now 65 or over but by 2030, this ratio will rise to one in five with life expectancy increased to over 80 years. This context was the rationale for the Enabling our Elderly at Home through Design workshop organised by the Centre for Enabled Living (CEL) and the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA). It was held at the pioneering new Khoo Teck Puat Hospital - a green, and patient-friendly hospital.
The workshop, led by Julia Cassim was part of the WDA's Skills Training for Excellence Programme (STEP). It was the first in Singapore to bring together healthcare and design professionals from major healthcare providers such as Singapore General Hospital, Khoo Teck Puat Hospital and NTUC Eldercare, and leading design organisations such as Hewlett Packard, Singapore and Philips and the FZD Design School.
The aim was to develop innovative and useful ideas to help the elderly people to lead active and independent lives. "We hope to encourage agencies across multi-disciplines to come together to collaborate, promote creativity and innovation in the social service sector and helping persons needing care live an enabled life", said Ms Lee Kwai Sem, Chief Executive, CEL.
Twenty two professionals from the healthcare and design sectors visited isolated elderly residents of Singapore Housing Development Board (HDB) apartment blocks and with insights gained created design concepts. These were pitched to a panel of judges from the Design Singapore Council and the CEL at the end of the third day.
The results
The Judges and People's Choice Awards were both won by Team Imagination Movers for Transition - a holistic home-moving programme to help those who are moving. It was inspired by their design partner, an elderly lady who had been unable to cope with the amount of tasks that needed to be done to downsize and settle herself into her new home.
The Team Synergy Award went to Team Canbridge for iCan, a community-based service, matching software application and a communications campaign to enable elderly people to contribute to their community by matching the and offering personal services in return.
The Best Presentation Award went to Team Toto for Wink - a shower stool that minimises risk in the shower and allows people with poor balance to shower safely.
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