Book excerpt: The text presents the conclusions of four years joint work of 12 European laboratories on mobile robotics technology for healthcare services. The book bridges the human factors and the demands of real-life applications to the achievements of the robotics technology. It is organize d in 15 chapters analyzing topics covering all the related fields and including but not limited to: user - application requirements, human machine interfacing, mobile robots' and mobile manipulators' control architectures, navigation and sensing strategies, and robot - smart building interconnection. It also provides technical details and hints to the reader on how to address real-life problems. The book also performs a historical review and includes an overview of the contemporary developments worldwide.