Elderly Medical Alarm Issue: When Do You Need Activity Monitoring

Posted by smithwill on August 9th, 2012

A regular elderly medical alarm does not come with an activity monitoring functionality by default. In essence, the importance of adding an activity monitoring service to your existing elderly medical alarm lies in whether or not you or the senior loved one is prone to suddenly falling unconscious. There are certain medical conditions that may leave a person unable to press the wearable panic button in a timely manner, and in such cases, it is important to walk the extra mile to enable them—that is, by constantly or regularly monitoring their activities inside the house.

But what are the common conditions that may require more than just the usual plain vanilla medical alert system? The following are just the tip of the iceberg.

Narcolepsy

People with narcolepsy are prone to falling asleep without warning. Narcoleptics are not necessarily seniors—they can be teenagers, or healthy people in their twenties, and still they are helplessly sleepy during narcoleptic episodes. The existence of narcolepsy as a major disability, along with the fact of it affecting people of a wide bracket of age, is a simple case for the use of medical alert systems as something that is not necessarily for senior citizens only. Moreover, there are many so-called “flavors” or levels of disorder intensity in narcolepsy—there are those who are so sleepy and find it so difficult to focus during the day, there are also those who suddenly zone out in the middle of a household chore and promptly assumes automatic “zombie” behavior. There are also those who suddenly fall asleep seemingly without warning—they may be in the middle of a job interview, or driving their vehicle, or having dinner. Regardless of the type of narcolepsy, the bottom line is that this disorder makes pressing the panic button on a regular medical alert device quite useless.

Epilepsy

In many ways, epilepsy affects a person’s life in mostly the same way as narcolepsy. Epilepsy commonly has certain triggers—an audio trigger, or a flash of light or certain colors perceived in a specific succession (some video games, due to their 3D graphics and colors, caused epileptic seizures in the past). Sometimes, however, a narcoleptic seizure simply occurs without warning—or at least, no obvious, visible trigger that can be seen by casual observers. And like narcolepsy, the manifestations of epilepsy make the design of the manual panic button meaningless.

Stroke

There have been recent studies that show how useless a regular medical alert systems can be in the event of a cerebrovascular accident or a stroke. As stroke affects the brain, and the brain is the one organ that regulates movement and various other motor functions, it can easily paralyze the limbs. And without functioning limbs, how can one press the panic button? It’s a Catch-22 situation.

Activity monitoring, therefore, helps you or the senior loved one to have better peace of mind and protection. This can be similar to the add-on feature called automatic fall detection in terms of its usage of special sensors, but then again the focus here is detecting the presence (or sudden suspicious absence) of activity. Moreover, there is no single established method for the implementation of activity monitoring. Rather, the system can be implemented in two major ways (although it really depends on the provider’s innovativeness and actual resources). One of the most common ways to implement activity monitoring is by having you or your loved one check in with the system at predetermined times. For example, if you have a regular daily routine with your household chores, you can designate how many times during the day and at what hour should the monitoring system call you up to check on your. This is an add-on service with most medical alert system providers, so setting it up is as simple as filling out a form or simply letting your provider know you’re “switching on” the feature.

Another way of implementing activity monitoring is by the use of sophisticated sensors and motion detection systems installed around the house. Obviously, this is more expensive than the former, as you may have to install several detection devices set up at strategic locations around the home that can maximize the detection efficiency. You will have to take care not to leave any blind spot—places that unintentionally are off your grid—and thereby reduce the effectiveness of the system. But whichever you choose to implement, the important thing is to understand that opting not to have activity monitoring when you have the above-mentioned conditions can be detrimental to the effectiveness of the rationale of using an elderly medical alarm system.

Rescue Alert of California is a leading elderly medical alarm system provider having specialized in medical alert systems for over 26 years. Their extensive years of experience, engineering, and research have brought about the highest level of senior medical care. Rescue Alert strives to provide information and resources for seniors, for additional information or to learn more about Rescue Alerts senior alert product or services, please visit RescueAlertofCa.com.