Digital Health Approaches to Geriatric Rehabilitation: A Narrative Paper.

Authors

Changwon Moon, Pamela Bregasi, Aminreza Khandan, Bijan Najafi

Published in

Annals of rehabilitation medicine. Volume 50. Issue 4. Pages 222-243. Epub Aug 11, 2026.

Abstract

Rapid population ageing is widening the gap between geriatric rehabilitation needs and constrained care capacity. Digital health offers new ways to deliver rehabilitation beyond traditional settings, but its role and limitations in geriatric practice remain unclear. To provide a narrative synthesis of how digital health can support geriatric rehabilitation, highlighting advances, challenges, and future directions. We conducted a narrative review of digital health approaches in geriatric rehabilitation, informed by the authors' clinical and technical expertise, synthesizing evidence on telemedicine, mobile health, wearable sensors, exergames, extended-reality platforms, and artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled systems across rehabilitation domains. Digital health interventions can support continuous monitoring, motor and cognitive training (including gamified exercise), behavioral self-management, and remote clinician oversight. Studies in selected older populations show feasibility, safety, and short- to medium-term improvements in mobility, frailty, pain, and cardiorespiratory fitness. However, the evidence base is fragmented, often excludes frail older adults and those with cognitive or multisensory impairment, and frequently focuses on surrogate sensor-derived outcomes, with limited long-term data on independence, falls, or quality of life. Persistent challenges include usability and digital-literacy barriers, the "grey digital divide," limited interoperability and workflow integration, and unresolved issues of data governance, privacy, and algorithmic transparency. Digital health has potential to augment geriatric rehabilitation and support healthy ageing, but its benefits are unlikely to be equitably realized without intentional design and implementation. Priorities include human-centered and co-design approaches, pragmatic trials, integration with rehabilitation workflows, and robust ethical and regulatory frameworks for data-driven and AI-enabled care.

PMID:
42703846
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 07 Sep 2026.

Read full publication at:
Please sign in to see all details.

Stats

1-terrible, 9-excellent. How would you rate this publication? Sign in in to submit your rating.

Post a comment

You need to be signed in to post comments. You can sign in here.

Comments

There are no comments yet.