First health apartments in the Smart Quarter Jena-Lobeda

Becoming smartly healthy in a smart environment: A significant milestone for the implementation of the Smart City Strategy of the city of Jena was reached today in the Smart Quarter Jena-Lobeda at Ziegesarstraße 13. In a cooperation between the city of Jena, the Jenaer Stadtwerke and the University Hospital Jena, the city's first health apartments were put into operation. These offer patients the opportunity to convalesce in a homely environment and, thanks to the latest technical aids, keep them in constant contact with the clinic staff. The Smart Quarter is providing two apartments in the 11-story residential block for this purpose, which will initially be co-financed by the city of Jena until 2027.

Tobias Wolfrum, Managing Director of Stadtwerke Jena, emphasizes: "The Smart City Jena and Smart Quartier Jena-Lobeda pilot projects aim to improve people's quality of life, and we have now created another concrete use case for this. This is what we as Stadtwerke, the city and the hospital have been working towards together since 2019. Our healthcare apartments focus on the well-being of patients and create an atmosphere in which they can feel at home. We are using the experience gained as a blueprint to establish the concept beyond the city limits of Jena."

The healthcare apartments in the Smart Quarter will initially be financed by the city of Jena, managed by Stadtwerke Jena and occupied by patients from the university hospital. The apartments offer a wide range of on-site healthcare services. They are designed to be barrier-free and equipped with highly functional amenities. This includes smart-home equipment with voice control, care beds, height-adjustable kitchens and bathroom units, emergency systems, rentable e-wheelchairs and smart TVs. If needed, patient care can also be provided by a nursing service. The establishment of a telemedicine room for digital medical consultations in the Smart Quarter is expected to expand the health aspect in 2024.

Benjamin Koppe, Head of Department for Finance, Security and Citizen Services, says: "The opening of the health apartments is a key milestone in the implementation of our Smart City strategy. With this measure, we want to test innovative solutions in healthcare to improve the quality of life of our citizens in the long term." Demand for the healthcare apartments is already high, as initial experience at the university hospital during trial operation has shown.

Prof. Dr. Otto Witte, Medical Director of Jena University Hospital:
"The health apartments make it possible to integrate medical application scenarios in a new way, especially for outpatients or day inpatients. This means that patients receive close medical and nursing care at the hospital during the day and can then use the comfortable and well-equipped living quarters of the health apartments in the immediate vicinity. This contributes significantly to the recovery and well-being of the patients. In addition, it further pursues the goal of ensuring that patients do not stay longer than medically necessary in the hospital after acute inpatient treatment."

The healthcare apartments in the Smart Quarter are being funded by the German Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Building (BMWSB) and the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) as part of the city of Jena's Smart Cities model project.

To the Smart Quarter Jena-Lobeda

The Smart Quarter Jena-Lobeda is a model project of the Stadtwerke Jena Group, which aims to which is intended to relieve tenants in their everyday lives and improve their quality of life. To this end, the municipal housing company jenawohnen is refurbishing three existing buildings of the WBS70 housing type and equipping them with smart home components and bookable services for health, mobility and logistics. By the end of 2024, this will create Jena-Lobeda neighborhood, half of which will be rent-controlled.

The smart city strategy of the city of Jena

The Jena project with the slogan "Jena digitizes, learns and shares - Our city creates and uses knowledge" is part of the 2nd season of the funding program "Model Projects Smart Cities "of the Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Building (BMWSB) and receives a total of 17.5 million euros for the strategy and implementation phase. As a model project and ongoing process, Smart City Jena pursues the goal of making living together in Jena sustainable and efficient in the future. In doing so, the focus is on people and they are closely involved in the development of solutions. As a city association, the municipal administration and municipal companies are actively shaping the digital transformation of the city in cooperation with the citizens of Jena. The project offers the opportunity to break new ground and thus - in line with the concept of the Smart City model project - to create experience and test areas that can be transferred to other cities and regions. The aim is to share this knowledge gained from the implemented projects, such as the occupation of health apartments or the establishment of a telemedicine room, and thus enable transfer to other districts and cities. The "Smart Neighborhood Jena-Lobeda" measure is primarily application-oriented; it is less about transforming fundamental structures and more about using digital technologies to create added value in everyday life for the urban community and its citizens.