Telemetry and sensors and other remote operation.

[ericmark]

Without being over intrusive I want to monitor what my mother is doing. At least being able to work out which room she is in and would be nice to know if sitting in a chair or lying on the bed as if that's the case she is not lying on the floor.

I have a couple of old PLC's but only around 4 inputs and outputs and rather basic so not really much help.

Wheel chair is a problem static chairs can have sensors but wheel chair is more of a problem. If she has fallen asleep in the wheel chair I don't want to wake her or travel 15 miles to see she is OK. But if she has fallen then clearly I do.

The Pet Cam seems a good idea however better if she could also see me. Using an old PC with remote access does seem one way but no real idea how I can control it from home. Or how to interface with a PC to monitor items.

I have a USB toy which fires rockets so clearly there is the option to have inputs and outputs from a PC what would be nice is a panel with lets say 6 in/outs for simple switches which can show me which PIR or door switch is triggered.

Any ideas please.

 

[Mursal]

E-Bay is your friend , not necessarily to buy from, but to see whats available to solve your problem.

I would have thought a 6 or 8 security camera unit, with internet access would be the most straight forward option.
Obviously you are going to keep your mother in the loop, everyone likes their privacy.

 

[ChrisR]

I'd recommend a phone alarm system where she has a caller thing round her neck all the time which just has a button on it to call a special help line. Ma in law has one. Outside the house there's a key in a coded Keysafe which the helpline people have the number for. They're very good, and doesn't cost a fortune.

 

[jj4091]

I'd recommend a phone alarm system where she has a caller thing round her neck all the time which just has a button on it to call a special help line. Ma in law has one. Outside the house there's a key in a coded Keysafe which the helpline people have the number for. They're very good, and doesn't cost a fortune.

The only problem with those systems & what completely defeats the object of them, is that people forget or refuse to wear the fob. We had that problem with both my parents & my in laws.

 

[ericmark]

Thank you my mother already has two buttons one for wrist the other for around the neck as it was all too regular for the button to go missing. The spare which is the wrist one hangs with a bit of weak ribbon in the wet room so should she forget it is where she is most likely to have problems and should the one around the neck go missing the wrist one can be worn until it is found. She also has a bed sensor so from 11pm to 6am if she is out of bed for more than an hour it raises the alarm. There is already a key safe and four visits by carers.

This weekend is a typical example of how the carelink does not work. Mother got out of bed and did not return. As designed the system alerted the monitoring station who should try to talk to my mother to see if she is OK. However their caller ID was withheld so my mothers phones did not ring. At the moment my caller ID is faulty on my home phone so don't know if they tried that they did however try my mobile this is 5:30 am and my mobile is on charge down stairs. By time I got down stairs it had stopped ringing and the caller ID was withheld so not a clue who had called. I had forgot to switch off my bluetooth in the car so until I was dressed I could not listen to any voice messages. Before this was sorted they rung my wife's mobile and told her the alarm had gone off and they could not get my mother to answer the phone. So into car and a 12 mile round trip to find all was OK it was the daft call centre who by switching off called ID had failed to ring my mothers phone.

In the house there are four phone sockets. Fitted many years ago there is no open reach master socket there is just a GPO junction box from the days of the original party line. So only way to isolate sockets is by hard wiring changes they are all in parallel. There is one phone in the bed room which is not cordless so should there be a power cut one phone works. The carelink controller is in series with the cordless phones so if they are off the rest the call is still made but in parallel with the emergency phone so if that is knocked then whole system fails.

Last weekend I also had a problem. My mother had knocked the phone off the bed side table so although the alert was sent when the pressure sensor failed to detect my mothers weight on the bed the care call centre was unable to phone her to confirm all was OK. So again we were all disturbed. Since it was her first day home from hospital I was sleeping at my mothers house to make sure all was OK. However they phoned my wife who in turn phoned me on my mobile to say there was a problem. I was able to see my mother sleeping sound.

So having all these problems I have gone for unlimited broad band at my mothers house and once up and running pet cam in living room will clearly assist. But for other rooms there is more of a problem clearly don't want cameras in the bedroom. My hope is to set up an old PC with the ability to remotely control from at home. This would have many advantages one being I can have a hard drive full of films which I can remotely select for my mother. The TV now has a Flipper remote control with just 6 big buttons. On/off, Mute, Volume up, Volume down, Channel up, Channel down it works both old sky (no subscription) box and TV from one control with up to 25 programs programmed in and works well. But this means the DVD is now unusable by my mother so hope to use a PC instead controlled from home.

So if PC is running then any USB device to monitor doors, or PIR activation could also be used and should my mother knock a telephone off the hook it all still works even with just the pet cam I can talk to her without her needing the phone.

So the question is what is there other than cameras to help monitor. Being able to see heat for example may work to find which room she is in. Any ideas please.

 

[ChrisR]

Carelink has always worked fine for us. If/when they can't get through to her or us, they just turn up and let themselves in.

If you put in a pet cam, you could have a little led lightboard in the shot with triggers from PIR or pressure mats, timer on the wheelchair wheels/seat, etc?
It would be simple electronics to make the leds change colour or move along a bar or count down to indicate the time since she was in or has been in the relevant room.
Triggers could be wireless of course. Ebay, £20 or so for a dozen inputs.
"Simple" is relaltive. Trigger loads a counter with "9" on a 7 segment display, then without further triggers, each (one per room) decrements by one each minute, then goes out at zero. Arrange to suit.

 

[ericmark]

Slowly I am working out methods. Found today there are alarm systems which use wireless magnetic contacts these should work easy with a wheel chair to show if occupied I am sure can also make them work with bed and easy chair however will not work with loo so looking for simple beam breaking device.

 

[ChrisR]

Have a look on eBay for person sensors - you probably have. Power's going to be a problem in a bathroom, so you could use a ceiling mounted PIR.
With all these things, if a sensor says she's not moving then she could be on the floor or just reading/watching TV?
if you have a sensor of any sort on the wheelchair you've got a battery, so it would be easy to have an IR thing by the spokes so you'd know if she'd moved it recently.

Come to that a weight sensor in the seat would give enough variation while she moved about , to do the same. Ditto the bed.
I can find some bits and do a diagram if it helps.

The whole point is that you don't want to be be sitting monitoring, you only want a signal if it seems there's something wrong, yes?
It falls in to the "Surely something must already exist to do this", area.
Probably $1.99 post paid, from China...
Wheelchair moves OR bed moves OR walking stick tip switch changes state OR float switch in cistern OR etc etc, resets the timer.


I need one for my computer chair, so
If I'm on it AND it hasn't rotated at all then a buzzer wakes me up after 5 minutes. I'd get more sleep instead of finding an H imprinted on my forehead at 4 in the morning. There's probably a bit of s/w for that.