The ‘Living Lab Care Flanders’ is an innovation instrument to create a space for the testing and experimentation of new services, processes and products by end-users. The focus of the initiative is the demand for care by the elderly. It will apply an open innovation approach and a broad eco-system of partners along the care-value chain (primary care, government, end-user, etc.).
The ‘Living Lab Care Flanders’ set up in late 2013 a number of mechanisms to support the testing of the societal and economical impact of innovative solutions in elderly care: several platforms as test infrastructure, several projects using the test infrastructure and for each platform an end-user committee, which places the end-user in a central position. Elderly, patients and informal caregivers are in charge of the co-creation process; i.e. development, testing and adjusting of the selected projects of care innovation in their own work and living environment.