Cherry Labs Awarded NIH Grant to Help Older Americans Age in Place Independently Using Privacy-protected, AI-based Monitoring

Cherry Labs announced they received a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and are embarking on a study to help maintain independence for older adults using their AI-driven Cherry Home technology.

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Cherry Home helps support frail or cognitively impaired older adults to age in place, safely in their homes. The $320 billion home healthcare market is expected to grow at 7.9% a year. Using ambient intelligence (AI), Cherry Home unobtrusively (and with privacy protections) monitors for potential emergencies and measures activities of daily living (ADLs) of seniors in their homes. These quantified metrics help clinicians and caregivers know when to intervene and provide additional support — before it’s too late and clinical deterioration occurs.

Stanford-based principal investigator Nirav R. Shah, M.D., MPH will spearhead the study titled: Continuous ADL Monitoring Using Computer Vision to Maintain Independence and Improve health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in older adults at risk for Alzheimer’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease Related Dementias (AD/ADRDs).

The study’s hypothesis is that ADL-related data captured by the system can help detect and even prevent adverse events and maintain HRQoL in home settings. Developing a highly personalized and clinically interpretable AI system for monitoring ADLs in the home will give clinicians an early warning system.

Cherry Home already offers this service to homes and care facilities in select markets. The study will further quantify the ability of Cherry AI to help maintain or improve HRQoL in Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) enrollees. By predicting future changes in ADLs and associated adverse events, this study will define the use case for ADL-related management, further proving its value in long-term care.

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Principal Investigator Dr. Shah says, “This NIH grant is the first of its kind. By taking a technology already validated to monitor safety in industrial settings, and deploying it in people’s homes, we can leverage the scale and lessons learned to preserve independence and dignity of older adults. By awarding Cherry this grant after a rigorous peer review process, the NIH has registered a vote of confidence for such solutions.”

By 2030, all Baby Boomers will be older than age 65. Approximately 77 million Americans (1 of every 5 adults) will be retirement age by 2034. Nearly 90 percent of adults over 65 want to remain in their current homes as they grow older, according to the AARP. As a result, the need for home-based support solutions will grow exponentially.

Cherry’s CEO Max Goncharov opines, “Of course most people would choose to ‘age in place’ rather than living in an institution like a nursing home. Solutions like Cherry Home support that overwhelming preference, and we’re excited that this NIH-funded study will help care providers like PACE programs deliver better, safer, and higher quality care, efficiently and with reduced burden on staff.”

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