Kwido Mementia

Twinning solution

Software solution designed for cognitive stimulation and training for elderly

Twinning type

Full adoption

Main policy priority

Digital tools for citizen empowerment and for person-centred care

Originator

Ideable Solutions (Spain)

Adopter(s)

Fundatia Ana Aslan International (Ana Aslan International Foundation) (Romania)

Short description

Dementia and moderate cognitive impairment are two of the most common geriatric neuro-degenerative syndromes and challenges faced by citizens in all member states of the EU. Kwido Mementia is a disruptive and innovative software solution specially designed for cognitive stimulation and training for adults above 65 years old, based on the combination of cognitive training and games through new technologies such as a dedicated app and virtual reality. In particular, it aims to strengthen attention, calculation, executive functions, language, memory, and orientation skills. The goal of the project is to combat cognitive impairment and dementia in patients who attend daycare centers on daily basis, followed by therapies at home.
The Ana Aslan International Foundation is a leading non-profit research, education, and high-profile medical services organization, with special expertise in aging and brain aging aiming to reach more than 25,000 citizens in a three-year period after the twinning implementation.

News

Twinning activities

The project implementation started with two months delay due to the longer administrative aspects. The first online meeting of the project’s executive board took place on the 10th of September 2020 and an adjusted timeframe was put in place, trying to catch-up on the initial delays. Starting from October 2020, the offline activities were initiated: the translation of the platform’s content to Romanian, performed by IDE experts and continuously improved based on the feedback from the ANA team. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, all meetings within the ANA team and with IDE took place virtually. As part of the offline activities, beyond the initial translation and adaptations for the Romanian language, efforts were directed towards promoting the twinning initiative to the relevant stakeholders.

Outcomes

The twinning project Kwido Mementia led to the creation of a fully adapted and functional Romanian version of the cognitive games developed by IDE that has been tested by a small number of primary end users (seniors aged 60+). So, full transfer and adaptation and minimal implementation.

Added value and benefits

Kwido Mementia was a solution that already showed encouraging results in terms of acceptance and adoption by the Spanish seniors; also it showed clinical benefits that were published in a respected medical journal. Therefore, it seemed logical that this twinning initiative would provide a very good opportunity to make this innovative, attractive and already working solution available to the Romanian seniors in order to help improve their cognitive status and overall wellbeing.

Barriers and success factors

Barriers: The shortened timeline of the project combined with the pandemic situation and its effects on all the partners has limited the full deployment of the solution as initially planned. Also the new emerging EU regulations on medical devices (from May 2021) have raised additional demands for IDE that has initiated the process of registering Kwido Mementia as an EU certified medical device. Success factors: the very good cooperation between all partners involved in the twinning; the commitment of the ANA team members in getting tasks done under difficult circumstances; the partnerships established by ANA with key stakeholders and its expertise recognised by the senior community as a provider of solutions for healthy brain aging (specifically reflected here in the interest shown to the ads for Kwido Mementia).

Outlook

The twinning partners are waiting for IDE to obtain the EU certification for Kwido Mementia and also to see the feedback from users incorporated in the solution. The twinning partners’ intention, based also on the interest expressed by seniors when they promoted the projects on their social media channels, is to reach a large number of seniors through their partnerships with the Seniors’ Clubs/Centres from Bucharest. The partners have already signed an agreement with the Seniors Centre of the Bucharest Municipality which has more than 60,000 seniors in their network; the management of the respective organisation has been informed about the Kwido Mementia solution and they are eager to promote it to the seniors once it becomes available.

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