“Smarthome Features as a Service” for Older Adults

technologist-holding-the-hand-of-an-older-adult-and-helping-her-to-use-the-controls-for-a-smart-home-in-the-style-of-pointilism

Longevity Explorers have reported on how they have used different smarthome features to improve the quality of life of people with vision impairments, people with hearing difficulties, people with limited mobility, and people facing early cognition impairment — as well as people who just find these new capabilities “fun” and “useful”. However, at present there is a “barrier” to widespread adoption of smarthome features that can benefit older adults — the fact that most of the interesting applications require an element of Do-it-Yourself (“DIY”) capability.

We believe there is a big opportunity to broaden the deployment of these empowering smarthome features to others — by using a “smarthome features as a service” model. This Article explains our thinking, and describes a pilot project we are considering in partnership with one of the Villages in Northern California.

Rooms are Never The Right Temperature

Rooms are Never The Right Temperature

My Mom’s heating and cooling HVAC system doesn’t distribute the air well throughout her home

I was running into the same problem in my house, and I was manually turning on floor and ceiling fans, but this can get tiring. I wanted a solution.

Remote Control for the Smoke Alarm

If you, or your remote loved one, is capable of handling a mobile phone app under stressful conditions, some smoke alarm providers such as Nest allow you to use the app to silence it.

IF… you can find your phone, unlock it, and open the app all during this stressful time.

Seminar 4: Smarthome Features for a Better, Safer Life

Smart home features Seminar 4

This is the fourth in our seminar series on Aging in Place Technology and Tools to Live Independently for Longer.   View and Listen to the Seminar     Abstract Richard Caro and Frank Engelman have an ongoing collaboration to publish a series of use cases and recipes for specific “smart home features” — useful … Read more

Seminar 2: Tools to Minimize Loneliness and Isolation

Seminar on Loneliness and isolation, Seniors

This is the second in our seminar series on Aging in Place Technology and Tools to Live Independently for Longer.   View and Listen to the Seminar     Abstract As many of us have been reminded during the pandemic, isolation and loneliness are very undesirable. But isolation is a frequent accompaniment to aging, as … Read more