Investigating robot navigation in health care with the Giraff telepresence robot

Abstract

The Norwegian public healthcare system will not have the manpower to care for the elderly at the same level as now, unless technological solutions are found to make the most of the available manpower. This thesis investigates potential technologies for allowing the Giraff, a telepresence robot, to navigate and patrol an eldercare center autonomously, thus letting caregivers save time when checking on the care recipients. It describes the design and implementation of a platform to interface with the Giraff's hardware, and demonstrates that the developed system is a useful platform for developing such navigation systems.