Care professionals' experience of deploying an original non-autonomous air-purification robot in residential care homes in Ireland and Japan

The worldwide pandemic reemphasized the significance of care work and its sector, and the greater role that can be played by digital welfare technologies and autonomous machines. However, there remain challenges in the way of smooth implementation of new technologies such as robots into care settings, for example, the degree of acceptability, safety risks to care recipients and perceived usability by end users. In order to test and explore the process by which such a digital device would be perceived and adopted by care professionals in different cultures, an original non-autonomous air-disinfection robot was developed for our cross-boundary, proof-of-concept research. The robot was first developed and introduced in Ireland, and following the completion of its eight-week long trial, the same equipment was transferred to and used in Japan for eight weeks in 2022. Prior to its instalment in both locations, training was provided to seven main users (comprising physiotherapists, nurses and social care professionals) working full-time in each residential care home. Semi-structured interviews, observations and focus groups took place, with system usability scale questionnaires distributed before, during and after the trials. The findings suggest that the users had positive perceptions of the device and its usability. Human-robot interactions in two countries are compared. The adoption process demonstrated that additional efforts were required to transform a piece of functional equipment into an interactive and accessible robot for multiple users. The study indicates care professionals' needs and views concerning automation and human-robot interactions, as well as future opportunities for co-design, development and implementation of care robots.