>> Live from Las Vegas, it's theCube covering the AWS Accenture Executive Summit, brought to you by Accenture. >> Welcome back everyone to theCube's live coverage of the AWS Executive Summit here at the Venetian in Las Vegas, I'm your host Rebecca Knight. We have three guests for this segment. Doctor Justin Marley, he is a consultant psychiatrist for the NHS in the U.K., Chris Ashley, Technology Delivery Lead Associate Manager, and Gayle Sirard, Applied Intelligence Lead North America for Accenture, thank you so much the three of you for coming on the show. >> Thanks. >> Well, thanks for having us. >> Very much, yeah. >> I'm really excited about the topic that we're going to have today. which is a home healthcare system for the elderly. I'm going to start with you, Doctor Marley. In terms, can you just provide the context of what, of sort what this problem is with an elderly person living at home, experiencing loneliness, experiencing isolation, can you paint the portrait for our viewers? >> Yes certainly, so the older adult population is heterogeneous, but what happens is as people get older they retire from work, they lose part of their purpose in life, sadly they lose loved ones in their lives, and can often find themselves at home by themselves. As people get older, they start to develop cognitive impairment, it may not be at the level of dementia or it may be at the level of dementia. And so, they become increasingly isolated. And there's something called a digital divide, which is basically, we're living in a connected world which is permeated with digital technology to help connect people. The older adult population haven't grown up with this technology, so they're a little bit disconnected from all of this, which just adds to everything else. >> So what is the idea here, so he just described older people who are lonely, who are experiencing forgetfulness, they've lost a lot of their friends and social connections. So what's the answer, what's the solution here? >> Our mission is to help people feel socially connected in this, it's always changing, this digital world and stay independent in their own home for a bit longer. So, what we've done is we've made an Alexa Skill and web portal. So, an Alexa Skill is just like an app on your iPhone. And it's really about day to day help. Everyday, little things, so medicine reminders or finding things that are happening in their area. And just a bit more independence, a bit more joy day to day. >> So Gayle, so what did this look in practice? So we have this Alexa who is in a person's home and reminding the person to take his or her pills and just providing a little connection. So, just describe to me what it looks like. >> Yeah, so I mean, well if you kind of take a step back a minute and you think about this, as Doctor described right, the impact of an individual sitting at home alone and you think about their daily lives and what they're doing, this solution starts by really thinking about what are they doing on a daily basis and what's going to motivate them to get up and get engaged? So, fundamentally this solution thinks about the process that they do and it's constantly learning the behaviors that they're doing on a daily basis and as you know there's constant reminders. You start to get forgetful, so there's activities that you have to do and if you don't do, you become stagnant, lonely. And so, getting a system that allows them to learn their behaviors, understand what those behaviors are, and what's going to motivate them to wake up, get excited everyday, feel engaged. Fundamentally, this system is about learning that and nudging them to get engaged and move forward. The thing I really love about this is, if you think about sort of what we're doing here, fundamentally we're taking really sophisticated technologies, artificial intelligence, and voice recognition and applying it to an everyday process. Which is like so exciting to see the application of the elderly adopting a solution like this. And being able to reach out and engage through this new technology channel. >> And it is, as you said, learning the behaviors, it's learning their proclivities, but it's also providing a bit of social interaction for these people who are incredibly lonely. What have you seen, Doctor Marley? >> So, what we've seen is from the Hanover Project, which the Liquid Studio team in London have been working on. Which is some of the work in sheltered accommodation with older adults and Chris can talk a little bit about that, we've also been trialing it in a young onset dementia group, as well. So, we're looking at people with dementia across the lifespan, both young and old. And we've had some very promising feedback from the younger group, as well. >> So yes, how are you using this for people who are experiencing the onset of dementia? >> So, the idea is that, well first of all what we've had to do is to start a trial, a pilot study. So, we're currently going through the ethics committee process, which is very important for vulnerable adults, we can't just trial a new technology in this group, but we've had a design session with the Liquid Studio team, they've come in and they've showcased the technology within the group. And this is a group of people with young onset dementia and their carers, and we've had some very interesting feedback about how they can communicate with it and how easy it is to understand, and some of the features that we've been developing, such as the information about the condition that they can access from the home care solution. >> Chris, I wanted to ask you about the role of empathy in technology, so here's artificial intelligence which is it's not human intelligence. >> Absolutely. >> It's not our human social intelligence, but yet empathy is so important. Particularly in a technology like this. Can you, can you talk about how you approach this question? >> So, I take your point completely. It is AI, it's not a real human. And ultimately, we would love it if every single old person had human contact everyday, but it's just not the case. And I have sat with people, one of whom is my nan, and genuinely she was just like, it's really nice to have a voice in the house, my grandad's been dead for 15 years, she's been alone for 15 years in that same house and she loves it, when Alexa sang her Happy Birthday because it was configured with the birth, I put her birthday in and she was just like, I love it. She says goodnight to it's like, oh sleep well, I do call her regularly, but knowing that she has that is amazing. >> So it's giving peace of mind to the loved ones, too. >> Absolutely, yeah. >> Exactly, so talk a little bit more about what, so we've already seen great success, adoption is on the rise, what are some of things that you hope to add to this application going forward? >> So, we see it at the moment as a companion. So, it might be for people with dementia. It might just be for people who are alone and they feel a bit socially isolated. So, the Alexa platform is very powerful. It offers a very simple way to do things, like radio, if you want to mess around with an iPad, unlock it, make sure it's charged, find your contacts, call it, it's much easier to say, Alexa call my daughter. So, that's the things that we have and that's a great service, what we can add very quickly is IoT sensors, so if you put a sensor on the fridge, on the bathroom door, in the bed, you work out whether people are sleeping enough, whether they're eating enough food, whether they're drinking enough. And you're augmenting that role of the caregiver that comes along and sees, hang on, this person hasn't been sleeping very well at all for the last few days. One of the things we get people to do when they interact with home care, is just say, how are you feeling today? And they say, good or bad, and over time you build up a picture of that person's mental health. >> Because Alexa has built a rapport with her roommate. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> So, what you're describing it sounds like a very user-friendly, a straightforward interface that is perfect for people on the other side of the digital divide, as you just described. So, how do you work with technologists, Doctor Marley, in terms of helping the technologists understand where these customers are, I mean so many, I had a member of my family who had Alzheimer's and the idea was meet the person where they are. So, if they come to you and tell you that it's Christmas Day and you say, it is, Merry Christmas, but how do you help the technologists sort of get that? I mean it comes back to the empathy. >> So, in terms of where the person is, there are many different barriers to the use of technology, the sensor impairment, there's for example if someone has a moderate to severe level of dementia, then it would be very difficult for them to interact with the device. So, we have to kind of work with carers to work with them. So, there's all sorts of kind of complications about taking this out into the real world. And what we're also looking to do is develop a service with the AI at the front end, backed up by healthcare professionals at the back end. So, that we can quickly escalate if there's problems because the last thing that you want is someone to run into problems, for the technology to be able to detect that there's something is amiss, and not being able to do anything about it. So, I think combining the AI with all of the warning signs flagged up by the algorithms with healthcare professionals in the background ready to escalate in-house services is the best of both worlds. And gets the right services to the person at the right time, and I think that's only possible through this combination. >> Yeah, it's an extraordinary story. >> It is. >> It's really been a great conversation. Thank you all so much for coming on theCube and sharing it with our viewers. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> It's a pleasure, thank you very much. >> I'm Rebecca Knight, that wraps up our coverage of today's AWS Executive Summit. Join us tomorrow for more from AWS re:Invent. (quirky upbeat music)