Title: Co-developing a sustainable, meaningful, digital platform to enhance mobility and active ageing of community dwelling older adults (>75 years).
Funder: Economic and Social Research Council

Abstract: Our project will use two approaches, namely co-design, and co-production. Initially, the study participants (Residents from Two ExtraCare villages and two research officers from ExtraCare Charitable Trust, https://www.extracare.org.uk/) and the academic team will co-produce a document that describes 'mobility that matters' to older people within a supported-living setting- a measure or set of measures that are meaningful and contextual to older adults in a community'. The short-term outcomes of the study will be a set of recommendations to enhance a digital platform supporting mobility of older people. The digital platform is provided by our technology partner (Cush Health Ltd, https://cushhealth.com/ ). The recommendations will relate to the context of Cush partnership with ExtraCare. The long-term vision for the study relates to the wider policy-related implications enabling older adults in age-friendly cities and communities in the UK and internationally. Future funding for the long-term vision will be sought from organisations such as Innovate UK and Age Tech Accelerator, https://agetechaccelerator.com/

Lay abstract: Our team approach to investigating mobility in old age starts with understanding how mobility relates to the well-being of an older person. The WHO definition of mobility includes facilitating access to quality mobility aids and devices, https://www.who.int/disabilities/media/news/personal_mobility/en/ . We will use a standardised definition of physical activity (PA) and exercise as follows: Physical Activity is any bodily movement produced by the contraction of skeletal muscles that result in a substantial increase in caloric requirements over resting energy expenditure. Exercise is a type of PA consisting of planned, structured, and repetitive bodily movement undertaken to improve and/or maintain one or more components of physical fitness. Our research team will follow the WHO model of age-friendly cities (figure above) to deliver a holistic approach from a multidisciplinary team working with a chain of supported-living providers (ExtraCare, https://www.extracare.org.uk/about-the-charity/the-trust-overview/ ) to assess mobility in its wider context; an older person's fitness level, physical environment, social environment, and municipal services. Older people communities/villages in ExtraCare offer an ideal environment to qualify and quantify how a population of older people continue to mobilise and increase their physical activity. Our proposal pillars around understanding the problem, co-developing strategies, customising/ individualising solutions and testing and evaluating them in real life settings (enriched environment). A holistic approach to understanding mobility within a safety and well-being agenda by engaging with older people, their formal and informal carers, and providers of supported-living is crucial. Co-developing a person-centred understanding of what matters to older people will enable understanding the impact of mobility and the wide range of benefits from physical activity. We will work with a group of diverse (e.g. gender, ethnicity, mobility, cognitive functions and socio-economics) older people aged 75 and above in their independent-living environment. We argue that working closely with older people in a range of contexts, and sites across the country but within one organisation (ExtraCare), can deliver a minimum mobility-dataset on a digital platform.

Research activity codes: 3.1 PRIMARY PREVENTION INTERVENTIONS TO MODIFY BEHAVIOURS OR PROMOTE WELL-BEING;7.1 INDIVIDUAL CARE NEEDS
Health categories: GENERIC HEALTH RELEVANCE