TeleCare Service
The ultimate goal of the CareWheels Project is to deploy a TeleCare Service Network of CareWheels: hub and spokes; circles of care to support independent living through a virtual caring community. We are uniting the complementary needs of working-age people with disabilities who desire to participate more fully in society, with those of frail elders, whose growing numbers need effective new ways to age-in-place safely at home. The CareWheels Mandala Logo is a computer-generated fractal mandala, whose beauty, complexity and symmetry emerge from a simple iterative process, making it an ideal representation of the CareWheels concept:
To achieve this goal in time for the aging Boomers, we are developing an innovative TeleCare Service Network to deliver effective in-home care via networked SmartHomes. TeleCare Service Providers at the hub of each CareWheel provide support from their own SmartHomes through the network spokes and into the SmartHomes of clients on the rim of the CareWheel.
The CareWheels Project is based on the premise that our frail elders and people with disabilities share common needs and complementary desires. Most people would prefer to live independently in their own homes for as long as possible, but many require some assistance to do so. Many frail elders are fearful that if they should fall or become incapacitated, nobody will know to come to their aid. The majority of people with disabilities remain under- or unemployed, suffering the additional burdens of poverty.
Now these populations are in competition for a diminishing pool of home care attendants. Given these realities, CareWheels is combining two of the fastest growing occupations, computer support specialists and home health care assistants into TeleCare Service Providers who are empowered to deliver technology-enhanced caregiving. Working-age people with disabilities can provide TeleCare Services directly from their Networked SmartHomes into the SmartHomes of frail elders, providing compassionate support and social contact.
TeleCare Services such as wellness monitoring can support people to live safely and independently in their own SmartHomes. Wellness monitoring can help keep frail elders, their families and professional caregivers connected and informed of their well-being, reducing emergency room visits and premature institutionalization. We see that CareWheels is positively affecting self-esteem and well-being of our participants by improving their access to Assistive Technologies, computer networking, training, mentoring and the many benefits that derive from becoming contributing members of society. Our society will benefit from savings in healthcare costs and access to a new caregiving workforce, reducing our dependence on expensive services and redistributing scarce resources.
The CareWheels Mandala – a Cross-Cultural Pattern
The Sanskrit word mandala means ‘circle.’ Mandalas may be found in the stained glass windows of Christian cathedrals, ceilings of Muslim mosques and Buddhist stupas or dome-shaped shrines, Hindu yantras used in meditation and the Taoist “yin-yang” symbol representing the interdependence of opposites. Tibetan monks and Navajo Indians create sand mandalas, also referred to as medicine wheels. The mandala archetype represents self-healing of the person and community.
In his writings on mandala symbolism, Carl Jung referred to the mandala as the “archetype of wholeness” and “psychological expression of the totality of the self”. Jung found the mandala in many cultures and mythologies spanning the globe throughout the history of Humankind - an integral part of our collective unconscious that is shared by every person that has ever lived. The mandala is an unconscious state in which all opposites come together and are united. This union of opposites is the very process by which we become whole, through which we find peace.