Date published: 06/08/18
Care Home Digitisation – Michelle Sigauke
- Name: Michelle Sigauke
- Current Organisation: Leeds Beckett University
In May, Translate opened its summer student project scheme to support small medical technology development projects in the Leeds City Region. The scheme proved to be a massive success and 26 unique projects were funded. Learn more about their work in this blog.
My name is Michelle Sigauke, I am interested in technology and how it is used to make processes more efficient.
I am a recent BSc Business Information Technology graduate at Leeds Beckett University, and my current role is as a research associate. I interact with upper management and carers at care homes to increase my understanding of the digital systems that they are currently using. I will be analysing the information I collect in order to conduct a review of different computational methods they can use in their system to meet with their overall goal.
As someone with an IT background, my research interests revolve around finding user-friendly technologies that can be used by carers to assist them in their daily tasks. An example of this is using voice recognition devices or iPads to input data into resident records instead of using paper records. As part of this work, I conduct interviews with carers in order to understand their perception of digital devices, and how they might be used to assist them. I also provide some instruction to less confident carers on using computers, which decreases the digital divide.
Project goals
The aims of the project are to conduct a digital audit in care homes in order to understand the current system that is being used, and to determine data entry methods preferred by staff. Furthermore, I am to conduct an evaluation of digital methods by integrating information from various sources. I also aim to gain understanding from the care home staffs’ perspective on using audio based information gathering devices such as Alexa. The funding will help define the technologies that will be progressed and will support the scope of innovation. Moreover it is an opportunity to test form filling technologies and audio based technologies to determine the impact that they will have on the functionality of the care homes and staff.
