| dc.description.abstract | An aging population is one of the reasons why institutionalized care services are struggling to meet the demands. As a result, demands are met through extended focus on home care services, which in turn have stimulated the development of home care technology. When thousands of care receivers live in their homes, receiving care from institutions located elsewhere, proficient communication is important. Research show that communication and awareness among the actors in home care (i.e. professional health carers, informal carers and care receivers), is the key to frustration and discontent when insufficient.
This thesis review research on awareness in CSCW and, despite the lack of consensus of the term awareness, provides an understanding of the concept through exploring how it is represented in research. A selection of home care technologies are reviewed based on guidelines for designing awareness support. Results suggests that substantial improvements can be made in order to support awareness, especially in distributed settings. An opinion survey, using a questionnaire, is designed to survey professional health carers on their opinions related to awareness support in home care technology. Time was a factor in deciding not to send out the survey, and is considered as future work. | en |
