Sumit Mehra obtained his PhD on Blended Home-Based Exercise Intervention for Elderly
20-04-2021
Keep on Moving
Older people can continue to live independently for longer if they exercise enough. The WHO advises them to exercise regularly at a moderate intensity and to do exercises two to three times a week, which strengthen the muscles and stimulate balance. However, many elderly do not exercise enough.
Behavioral Change
Sumit Mehra, lecturer in Applied Psychology and researcher at the Digital Life research group, has thus demonstrated in his doctoral research how a blended intervention - with a shared eHealth environment - can be designed to achieve behavioral change that helps older people to maintain regular physical activity.
On Monday April 19. 2021, Sumit defended his thesis 'Development and Evaluation of a Blended Home-Based Exercise Intervention for Older Adults' at the University of Amsterdam. From the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, he was supervised by (co) supervisors Ben Kröse, former lecturer of the Digital Life research group (Faculty of Digital Media and Creative Industry), Peter Weijs (Faculty of Exercise, Sports and Nutrition) and Bart Visser (Faculty of Health).
Blended Intervention
For the doctoral research, 146 elderly did balance and muscle strengthening exercises at home for more than six months using a tablet with a personal exercise program. In addition to the use of the carefully designed app, the blended character of the intervention turned out to be crucial: the elderly also received coaching from AUAS students from, among others, Exercise Therapy, Physiotherapy, Applied Psychology and Nutrition and Dietetics. In addition, they followed a weekly group lesson. After six months, the elderly appeared to still be motivated to do additional exercises at home three times a week. They found both the tablet and the coach very helpful in this.
In short, 'keeping the human in the loop' is the key to effective eHealth interventions!
This doctoral research was funded with an NWO Doctoral Grant for Teachers.