IU Grad’s Senior-Tracking Tech Offers ‘Peace of Mind’
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowA recent Indiana University graduate’s young company that helps caregivers and loved ones keep tabs on the location of seniors with dementia or Alzheimer’s disease is on the verge of hitting the market. Chicago-based careband inc. founder Adam Sobol says pilot studies conducted in Bloomington and Chicago will inform final tweaks and the wearable technology could be released this summer. Seniors using the careband can be tracked at all times and the system’s monitoring devices provide location and other information that can be digitally accessed.
During an interview in The Business of Health, Sobol described how careband works without Wi-Fi or cellular signals. "The valuable part about the technology is that we can go anywhere and we don’t have to rely on a facility or someone’s home to have Wi-Fi," he told Special Projects Reporter Kylie Veleta. "We’re using a new low-power, wide-area network technology and this technology goes about three miles around someone’s home and then it builds off of each other, so in Bloomington, we put up a few different gateways around the city and we have a network — a careband network — that goes around the entire city, which can track the person wherever they are."
Sobol says the technology is empowering for caregivers and seniors affected by dementia by allowing them to be monitored without a physical presence, often allowing users to stay in their homes longer. He says careband will work at home, in a nursing home, as well as in assisted or independent living situations. You can connect to more about careband by clicking here.