Recently in Tokyo an AI-driven robotic leaned over a person mendacity on his again and gently put a hand on his knee and one other on a shoulder and rolled him onto his facet — a maneuver used to alter diapers or stop bedsores within the aged.
The 150-kg synthetic intelligence-driven humanoid robotic known as AIREC is a prototype future “caregiver” for Japan’s quickly growing old inhabitants and persistent scarcity of aged-care staff.
“Given our highly advanced aging society and declining births, we will be needing robots’ support for medical and elderly care, and in our daily lives,” stated Shigeki Sugano, the Waseda University professor main AIREC’s analysis with authorities funding.
Japan is the world’s most superior growing old society with a falling delivery fee, dwindling working-age inhabitants and restrictive immigration insurance policies.
AIREC demonstrates a maneuver for altering diapers or stopping bedsores with a researcher at Waseda University’s laboratory in Tokyo. Image: REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
Its “baby boomer” era, a bulging cohort created by a spike in postwar little one births from 1947 to 1949, all turned at the very least 75 by the top of 2024, exacerbating the extreme scarcity of aged care staff.
The variety of infants born in 2024 fell for a ninth straight yr, by 5% to a document low 720,988, knowledge from Japan’s well being ministry confirmed on Thursday.
The nursing sector, in the meantime, is struggling to fill jobs.
It had only one applicant for each 4.25 jobs accessible in December, far worse than the nation’s total jobs-to-applicants ratio of 1.22, in line with authorities knowledge.
As the federal government appears abroad to assist fill the hole, the variety of overseas staff within the sector has grown over time, however stood solely at round 57,000 in 2023, or lower than 3% of the general workforce within the discipline.
“We are barely keeping our heads above water and in 10, 15 years, the situation will be quite bleak,” stated Takashi Miyamoto, a director at Zenkoukai, an operator of elderly-care services. “Technology is our best chance to avert that.”
Zenkoukai has actively embraced new applied sciences, however the usage of robots has been restricted thus far.
At one facility in Tokyo, a bug-eyed, doll-sized robotic assists a care employee by singing pop songs and main residents in easy stretching workouts, whereas human caretakers busily tended to different urgent duties.
One of essentially the most sensible makes use of of nursing care applied sciences at present is as sleep sensors positioned beneath residents’ mattresses to watch their sleeping circumstances, chopping again on people doing the rounds at evening.
Waseda University professor Shigeki Sugano talks about AIREC on the college’s laboratory in Tokyo. Image: REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
Although humanoid robots like Tesla’s Optimus are being developed for the nearer future, Sugano stated robots that may safely work together bodily with people require next-level precision and intelligence.
“Humanoid robots are being developed the world over. But they rarely come into direct contact with humans. They just do household chores or some tasks on factory floors,” stated Sugano, who can be president of the Robotics Society of Japan.
“Once humans enter the picture, issues like safety and how to coordinate a robot’s moves with each individual’s spring up.”
Sugano’s AIREC robotic is able to serving to an individual sit up or placed on socks, cook dinner scrambled eggs, fold laundry and another helpful duties round the home.
But Sugano doesn’t count on AIREC to be prepared to be used in nursing-care and medical services till round 2030 and at a hefty value of a minimum of 10 million yen initially.
Takaki Ito, a care employee at a Zenkoukai facility, is cautiously optimistic about the way forward for robotic nursing.
“If we have AI-equipped robots that can grasp each care receiver’s living conditions and personal traits, there may be a future for them to directly provide nursing care,” he stated.
“But I don’t think robots can understand everything about nursing care. Robots and humans working together to improve nursing care is a future I am hoping for.”
© Thomson Reuters 2025.