Agnès is a woman in her sixties who works part-time and who has provided about 5 hours of help per week for 5 years to her aging husband. He is 75 years old and presents various problems related to aging, for example back problems or slight memory loss. He also has type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. He needs her help in daily life activities, according to his level of fitness (eg dressing), and she does all the house chores.
Needs | Current Approaches | Alternate Suggestions
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What could be created? |
1. Agnès is worried about the risks of choking. She would like a safe technique to administer her husband’s medications at night when he is sleepy. She would also like a technique for feeding him, since he is sometimes sleepy and she has to assist in these moments. | Her husband takes his medication independently during the day, but she assists him at night as he is sleepy. Same thing for food: she assists him when he is sleepy. In both cases, she tries to wake him up with a cold towel. | ||
2. Agnès would like her husband to be able to continue eating independently, even if he has tremors. | |||
3. Agnès would like a solution so that the help she gives her husband to get in and out of the car is less physically demanding for her. She is worried about getting hurt. | She physically assists her husband to transfer from the car to a manual wheelchair. They made a request for vehicle adaptation. | ||
4. Agnès wants to limit the risk that her husband falls. | Her husband has several assistive devices (motorized wheelchair, walker, cane). He uses the one that suits him according to his level of physical ability. Agnes encourages him to use them while she’s at work.. |
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