As the Number of Elderly Living Alone Increases, What AI Has Done...

Seongbuk-gu Official Saves Lives Following Recent Danger Signals
Gangnam-gu Partners with Naver to Introduce 'Clova Care Call'

An elderly person living alone in Yangcheon-gu receiving a call from an artificial intelligence (AI) check-in service. (Photo by Yangcheon-gu Office)

On the 28th of last month, a welfare officer at the Seokgwan-dong Community Service Center in Seongbuk-gu responded to a danger signal sent by artificial intelligence (AI) and went to the scene to rescue a life. An elderly person living alone in a semi-basement house had collapsed due to an acute stroke and was unable to move or call for help, and the officer discovered this situation and saved the person's life.

The welfare officer in the office was able to find the elderly person who had collapsed at home thanks to the ‘AI Check-in System.’ Seongbuk-gu operates an AI check-in system that automatically calls once a week to check on single-person households in need of care. When the district office's control center detects an abnormal signal, it immediately initiates a verification.

That afternoon, the welfare officer who arrived at the subject's house knocked on the door for over 30 minutes and listened through the gap in the semi-basement window before discovering and rescuing the elderly person who had collapsed in the kitchen hallway.

With the development of information and communication technology (ICT), more local governments are adopting AI check-in systems. The demand has surged as the number of single-person households among not only young people but also middle-aged and elderly individuals has significantly increased. The system’s remarkable achievements, including saving precious lives, have led to many cases of expanding or upgrading the service.

In Yangcheon-gu, the number of AI check-in service recipients was more than doubled in August compared to before. The AI check-in service automatically calls the recipients to inquire about their exercise, health, and meal status, analyzes the call content automatically, and delivers and manages the information with the district office and local officials. The local government conducts immediate on-site checks for households that do not answer the calls. However, the consent of the recipients is required, so a process of persuasion and understanding is necessary.

Joseongmyeong, Mayor of Gangnam-gu (right), and Hajungwoo, Head of Naver Cloud AI Innovation Center, signing the agreement (Photo by Gangnam-gu Office)

Gangnam-gu recently upgraded its service through an agreement with Naver. They introduced Naver’s ultra-large-scale AI HyperCLOVA-based AI check-in call service, ‘CLOVA Care Call,’ into Gangnam-gu’s AI check-in project and began providing the service this month.

Unlike the existing check-in services that ask short-answer questions, CLOVA Care Call remembers the context of previous conversations and enables natural, human-like dialogue. It also analyzes users’ conversation content regarding health, meals, sleep, exercise, and outings to monitor daily life and respond to emergency or crisis situations.

Based on the results of a single-person household survey, Gangnam-gu is providing AI check-in services to about 850 households at risk of solitary death and plans to expand the service by identifying new risk groups annually through surveys.

Geumcheon-gu selected the ‘AI Check-in Reliable Service’ as the best case in the ‘2023 Geumcheon Innovation Awards,’ a competition for excellent cases of innovative administration held last month. This service received high marks as a social safety net for preventing solitary deaths.

Geumcheon-gu stated, “This is the nation’s first service that comprehensively utilizes information and communication technologies such as electricity usage, communication information, and care apps to detect crisis signals in solitary death risk groups and enables 24-hour emergency dispatch.” They evaluated it as “a case that improved the limitations of the existing check-in service, which had difficulty dispatching immediately from the community service center during nights, weekends, or holidays, through public-private cooperation.”