{"id":502558,"date":"2026-06-20T13:29:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T13:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/502558\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T13:29:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T13:29:09","slug":"alter-ego-an-italian-hospitals-little-robot-carer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/502558\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Alter-Ego’: An Italian hospital’s little robot carer"},"content":{"rendered":"

A robot with expressive eyebrows that is designed to perform basic tasks to free up healthcare workers is being given a trial run by a hospital in Milan.<\/p>\n

Named “Alter-Ego”, the 1.2-metre tall robot can stand in for a doctor working remotely, bring a patient a bottle of water or guide them to treatment.<\/p>\n

Daniel Senna, a 31-year-old patient at the Maugeri Hospital, transmits his pain level on a screen attached to the robot’s chest.<\/p>\n

“Hi Dani. How are you? Do you need anything?” Ego asks wheelchair-bound Senna, as the data collected is sent instantly to the ward’s nurses.<\/p>\n

The robot has been undergoing testing since April in a department which treats people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a neurodegenerative disease.<\/p>\n

\"This
\nProject is a collaboration between the Italian Institute of Technology and the University of Pisa<\/p>\n

“At first, we were afraid the patient might have a negative reaction,” Christian Lunetta, director of the hospital’s neuromotor rehabilitation department, said.<\/p>\n

But they soon were “very satisfied, because the robot was designed to spark curiosity and its movements, or at least its functions, suggest a wide range of potential uses”.<\/p>\n

Ease burden<\/p>\n

The project is a collaboration between the Italian Institute of Technology and the University of Pisa in northern Italy and is currently being remotely controlled by an operator.<\/p>\n

From July, the robot will work autonomously.<\/p>\n

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has significantly accelerated progress in robotics but robots still need a great deal of training to operate independently.<\/p>\n

The aim with the Milan experiment is to work with patients and caregivers to better understand the limits of what a robot can or should do in a hospital ward, said Manuel Catalano from the Italian Institute of Technology.<\/p>\n

“Alter-Ego” could also eventually assist patients and their caregivers at home, he said.<\/p>\n

\"an
\nIt is hoped the robot can take over more repetitive tasks in hospitals and free up staff<\/p>\n

Lunetta pointed out that hospitals “have repetitive tasks” which “could be delegated to a good robot”.<\/p>\n

“This would also allow us to better value human beings, giving them the time to focus on the human relationship they must maintain with the patient,” he said.<\/p>\n

Nurses monitor patients while handing out medicine, picking up signals about physical or mental health.
“Alter-Ego” may seem capable but “no-one has considered directly delegating the administration of pills” to it, neurologist Rachele Piras said.<\/p>\n

It can be helpful in other ways though, “as the (neurodegenerative) disease progresses”, she said.<\/p>\n

Patients could find it liberating to be able to directly ask the robot for things, while doing so would also reduce the tasks of a caregiver, allowing him or her to “revert to simply being a companion, mother or daughter”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A robot with expressive eyebrows that is designed to perform basic tasks to free up healthcare workers is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502559,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[163,521,85,46],"class_list":["post-502558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502558"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502558\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}