A Community-Based, Technology-Supported Health Service for Detecting and Preventing Frailty among Older Adults: A Participatory Design Development Process

Frailty is a multifaceted condition that affects many older adults and marks decline on areas such as cognition, physical condition, and nutritional status. Frail individuals are at increased risk for the development of disability, dementia, and falls. There are hardly any health services that enable the identification of prefrail individuals and that focus on prevention of further functional decline. In this paper, we discuss the development of a community-based, technology-supported health service for detecting prefrailty and preventing frailty and further functional decline via participatory design with a wide range of stakeholders. The result is an innovative service model in which an online platform supports the integration of traditional services with novel, Information Communication Technology supported tools. This service is capable of supporting the different phases of screening and offers training services, by also integrating them with community-based services. The service model can be used as a basis for developing similar services within a wide range of healthcare systems. We present the service model, the general functioning of the technology platform, and the different ways in which screening for and prevention of frailty has been localized. Finally, we reflect on the added value of participatory design for creating such health services.