Innovation: Stavanger IBM Smart City for active ageing

Norway

AAI Domains:

• Capacity and enabling environment (use of ICT)

• Independent, healthy and secure living (improved access to health and care services, independent living, share of healthy life expectancy at 55)

The active ageing agenda is becoming increasingly recognised at local, national and international levels. It is now nearly 15 years since the World Health Organisation’s ‘Active ageing: a policy framework’ was published in 2002 and it will soon be a decade since the launch of the Age-Friendly Network of Cities and Communities to assist local government and communities around the world to adapt for an ageing population.

There are many challenges to be faced and to some extent they vary depending on the prevailing level of affluence and social welfare provision. In wealthy Norway with its highly developed social welfare system there is a large degree of economic and social security for people of all ages across the life course but sustaining this situation is likely to require socially innovative change.

The city of Stavanger in south west Norway is a city of approximately 130,000 people within the city municipality and around 320,000 in the greater metropolitan area. The city has been at the forefront of active ageing policy within Norway for the last decade, and in 2012 launched the Leve Heve Livet (Lifelong Living) programme to promote active ageing by empowering people of all ages to take greater responsibility for their health and well-being.

In 2013, Stavanger was one of 31 cities from around the world selected by competitive bidding to work with IBM, the multinational IT company, to be part of the IBM Smarter City programme. This programme develops ICT based solutions to a range of issues facing cities around the world including transport, sustainability and using ‘big data’ to improve public services. Stavanager’s Lifelong Living programme included several social innovations including the Everyday Rehabilitation programme that had been initiated in the Danish municipality of Fredericia in 2008 and produced impressive results in enabling older people to live independently following a programme of intensive rehabilitation.

The Stavanger version was piloted in the Madla district from November 2012 to April 2013 and an evaluation of the 34 older service users showed considerably better functioning after intensive rehabilitation and improved worker satisfaction. Preventive home visits for older people aged 80 and over have also been initiated and health centres have developed wellness programmes focusing on mental health and well-being alongside obesity and weight management programmes for people of all ages.

After interviews with a range of stakeholders, the IBM consultants made six key points about active ageing in Stavanger. The first was the importance of communication to change the mind set of people from the expectation of receiving services to living independently and self-sufficiently for longer through active ageing over the life course. They advocated an office for active ageing to improve the management and coordination of activities and becoming a member of the WHO age-friendly city network.

A more holistic and ‘elder-centric’ approach to health care with greater use of ICT for sharing data and e-health such as consultations over the web were also advocated. An ‘innovative budget’ for the next five years to pilot and evaluate new approaches was advocated and the further development of welfare technologies, notably tele-health and e-health, through the city’s fibre-optic network.

In relation to active ageing, Stavanger’s Lifelong Living programme is a fine example of a locally developed active ageing strategy that has encouraged several social innovations including Everyday Rehabilitation and preventive home visits which have both been shown to be effective in Denmark that effectively improve access to health and social care services.

The IBM Smart City dimension indicates increasing use of ICT in the provision of a range of health and social care services. The primary aim of the Lifelong Living programme and the Smart City programme is to enable active ageing over the life course so that older people are more capable of living independently for longer for their own benefit and to contain the costs of social welfare provision in meeting the long term needs of older people in an ageing population. This will be achieved when a greater share of life expectancy in older age (after 55 years) is spent in good health rather than limited by long-term health conditions.

Stavanger Kommune website