Thrilled at the thought of spending a whole 2 weeks with his ageing Dad who had come to visit, Dave had carefully planned their weekend outings in advance.
Leaving the office an hour early on Friday, as he had planned, Dave thought of calling his dad to tell him he was on the way home. But when repeated calls when unanswered, Dave began to worry.
He reached home to find his dad lying helplessly outside the bathroom door. He appeared to have slipped and fallen when stepping outside.
Thankfully, he wasn’t unconscious and apart from a sprain that prevented him from getting up; he seemed alright.
Dave’s dad was lucky, but not all seniors are as fortunate.
According to studies in Australia, one in every three people aged 65 years and over falls each year. One in every five require hospitalisation.
Falling is a serious health risk for the elderly and can cause broken bones and brain injuries.
Poor eyesight, mobility problems, and weaker muscles are some reasons seniors fall.
The financial costs of fall-related injuries are significant, besides the serious health consequences. In Australia, the average healthcare cost per fall injury for people aged 65 and over is around $1,500.
But falls are not the only problem with older people. Additional health complications arise as they age.
Dementia, diabetes, hypertension, and cardiac disease are some of the common illnesses seniors suffer from.
And aged care facilities groan under the increasing weight of demands placed on their already worn-out shoulders.
Constant monitoring of vital signs, the ability to tweak medication and offer personalised treatment in response to patient health data, or the simple act of spending quality time with their patients should form the bulk of what aged facilities provide in terms of care.
But in reality, things are different.
Most existing workers (especially the junior staff) do not possess the specialised skills that residents’ complex demands call for. Lack of training, unrelenting work pressure, low pay scales and an overload of administrative duties leave many workers unhappy, causing them to resign.
While Government funding can ease some of their problems like low pay scales and attrition, aged care facilities need to do much more than simply throw money at their problems and hope that they disappear.
Fortunately, there is a solution.
The rapid advancement of technology and its role in healthcare has changed the way we approach diagnosis, patient-care, and treatment.
Medical alert systems like smartwatches and safety pendants can detect falls and alert emergency response providers at the touch of a button. Cost varies from $25 to $45 per month, depending on whether they are landline-based or cellular in-home solutions. Some of them may even require a multi-year commitment.
Now, while such solutions are useful and can save a person’s life, aged care facilities need more than the ability to detect falls.
This is where medical alert systems such as TEQ-FallsAlert Powered by SOFIHUB come in.
TEQ-FallsAlert is a passive, real-time falls detection system for the elderly, based on unique radar sensor technology.
TEQ-FallsAlert does not require the resident to wear or do anything.
It can detect, record, and log activity in a room, from live fall detection to irregular movement without using cameras. This is useful when seniors have left their rooms and not returned, or aren’t in their beds when they are supposed to be.
TEQ-FallsAlert enables the elderly to live independently, knowing that they will receive help in an emergency, such as a slip or a fall.
For caregivers, it reduces the number of unnecessary visits and helps them provide care when it’s truly needed, resulting in significantly lower healthcare costs.
Priced affordably, and with a recurring monthly charge of just $10… multi-functional medical alert systems like TEQ-FallsAlert, help save money and provide a low impact, yet highly effective approach to meeting the needs of the elderly.
Visit SOFIHUB to know more about TEQ-FallsAlert, or purchase the fall detection alarm directly online.