NA Tracking elderly people

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Let'sgoflying!

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Dave Taylor
Let's say you had an elderly person (EP) who is quite active and capable despite major health problems, drives about town a lot, and town is 350miles from children.
EP forgets to check in regularly and does not answer phone a lot (can't hear it, or is driving, or is home but leaves it at the other end of the house - but always takes it when leaving home)
Children have regular spells of 'Can't find EP!!' which throws everyone into chaos for 4 hours each time.

Is it possible to use findmyiphone to follow the activity of EP?
EP would be completely on board with it.
Would that be a technically reasonable way to solve the problem?
 
There are apps for that as long as they keep their smartphone with them. Another option for the car would be a GPS unit that plugs into the car's OBD port.
 
I wish you the best of luck in tracking your EP. We bought a cell phone for my father for that purpose but, every time I went to the house, the phone was on his desk, plugged in to the charger. He never took it with him. It was nerve wracking for about a year, until his dementia progressed to the point where it was no longer safe for him to drive and I removed his truck from his farm.
That was quite a while ago and I'm sure there are better solutions now, whether designed for EP or for children.
 
I thought I saw a device that can be placed in shoes...the biggest problem with these devices is if they don't take it with them or misplace it then it's useless.
 
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One of my few regrets in life is that I didn't convince mama Steingar to move herself to the highlands of Guatemala when she began her cognitive decline. We could have hired locals to follow her around, it wouldn't have cost anything and she would have enjoyed the company immensely. Ahh well.
 
I need something to track myself after a few Glenfiddich's.

OTOH, my girlfriends might hack into the system and find out where I was with who last night. Worse for my health than old age.

Find my iPhone would work and it's free.

Cheers
 
Sounds like a great idea for a new app/business model to me.

Luddite Aware dot com.
 
If you could consider the car to be a proxy for the EP and put something like a Spot or a Delorme/Garmin InReach in the car, plugged into the car's battery. From a quick look, Spot may not have this capability but the Delorme literature mentions a powered RAM mount. This would probably be at least as reliable as considering the cell phone to be a proxy and would eliminate the issues with cell phone batteries, unable to see GPS birds, etc.
 
I've heard, maybe it's urban legend, that some facilities put up a fake bus stop outside. A resident wanders away, grabs a seat on the bench and waits for the bus that never comes. Staff doesn't have to go far to retrieve them. But if EP has access to a vehicle, that's a whole nother deal.
 
I guess microchipping would be out of the question?

Rich
 
RJM62 said:
I guess microchipping would be out of the question?

Rich
Click to expand...

The issue there is tracking the said chip. You could do NFC or RFID, but the EP would have to walk through the sensors. Some homes and hospitals already do this to elderly and new born patients. However, the chip is in their data wrist/ankle band.
 
Matthew said:
I've heard, maybe it's urban legend, that some facilities put up a fake bus stop outside. A resident wanders away, grabs a seat on the bench and waits for the bus that never comes. Staff doesn't have to go far to retrieve them. But if EP has access to a vehicle, that's a whole nother deal.
Click to expand...
Not urban legend...
 
Maybe we don't want to be found :)
 
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