COMMENT Technology is accelerating the transformation of the UK’s senior living sector. Antiquated notions of retirement villages as sleepy rural nursing homes are long behind us.

Demographic tailwinds, supported by Baby Boomers’ purchasing power and decades of underinvestment in purpose-built prime senior housing, have drawn institutional investment towards this highly scalable sector. Together, these drivers have aligned to create multi-generational smart retirement villages with new operating models.

Emerging digital infrastructure, such as 5G connectivity, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things applications, are rapidly transforming home environments. This futuristic picture is already a reality in Scotland’s first smart retirement village, developed by telecoms network provider Commsworld and charity retailTRUST.

In the Hugh Fraser Retirement Estate in Newton Mearns, East Renfrewshire (pictured), Amazon’s Alexa platform provides smart controls for everything from doorbells, lighting, refrigerators and blinds to home temperature, telephone calls, virtual assistance and operating the radio.

Health and safety priorities are managed through telehealth systems, which use multi-party videoconferencing between health professionals and patients, and telehealth apps use monitors, sensors and wearables to support independent living. These apps can collect residents’ vital health data at home (weight, pulse, blood pressure, blood glucose, lung capacity, etc), as part of expansive home monitoring systems, replacing reactive care with a proactive and preventative model.

Technology can also support physical and mental wellbeing, including through the use of virtual reality. Health and wellness company MyndVR has created a vast library of VR content for senior living communities designed to improve mental health and wellbeing. Research shows that “virtual reminiscence therapy” reduces anxiety and depression, with VR able to activate associations with photos, food, smells and music.

MyndVR says these non-pharmacological interventions can improve self-esteem and provide older people with a sense of fulfilment through reliving and talking about past life experiences. Further, physical wellbeing is supported through online personal training to improve fitness and nutritional content scanning systems to monitor and improve compliance with healthier diets.

Sustainability benefits

Many of these technologies offer overlapping benefits with other senior living pillars of design, demand and utilisation, including sustainability and community integration. Technology can optimise sustainable energy consumption, for example, by measuring temperature, light and movement, and using the data to detect energy wastage and encourage the user to change their behaviour. Use of these technologies has the added benefit of providing long-term cost savings for providers, for example through lower maintenance costs.

Adoption of these tech solutions has dramatically risen during the coronavirus pandemic, owing to restrictions on family visits. Incremental telehealth app adoption has catapulted to mass product maturity, with years of progress condensed into mere months.

VitalTech, a Dallas-based specialist, claims that more than 60% of people now prefer telehealth services over in-person clinic visits in the US. Covid-19 has also focused greater attention on air filtration and HVAC technology, which regulates air and water quality.

The collection of these metrics, however, comes with data protection challenges. Deploying new technology that processes health data will need to be carefully assessed via privacy impact assessments to ensure compliance with data protection laws such as GDPR.

These assessments often look to minimise collection of data, which can be at odds with artificial intelligence that looks to hoover up data from as many collection points as possible. Another challenging area is transparency of data uses. Affected residents and patients would need to understand how their data is being used in an accessible way.

Scaled investment

The UK’s ageing population provides context for the sector’s investable scale. Higher life expectancy and lower birth rates will markedly change the UK’s demographics. In the next 20 years, the UK population will increase by almost 6m – 99% of that net national population growth is among people aged 55 and older, according to Office for National Statistics projections, providing a clear context for scaled investment in the elderly living sector.

Senior living and smart retirement villages will become an increasing part of the residential life cycle in the decade to come. The Associated Retirement Community Operators, which represents the UK retirement community sector, aims to increase the number of people living in retirement villages from 70,000 to 250,000 by 2030.

Technology will support that objective and enable compliance with increased expectations, standards and regulations, further broadening the sector’s appeal and providing future opportunities for developers and operators.

Rachel Orton is head of the senior living group at Addleshaw Goddard