Medical Guardian, Active Guardian: Review

We acquired this product (the Freeus Belle+, rebranded as the Active Guardian*) and evaluated it over several weeks, as we have done with many of the competing products.

We tested this product at the same time as the Lively Mobile. Both products have similar features. Both performed well. 

Here are the key findings.

1. In our tests, battery life was roughly 4.5 days. This is noticeably longer than most other products with similar characteristics, which usually have battery life of around 1.5 days. This may well make a difference, depending on your lifestyle, and would be the primary reason to choose this specific product over similar competing products.
    
2. Location capability seemed quite similar to the Lively Mobile, and quite similar to the other mobile medical alerts we have tested. In other words, the product mostly knew where we were to within a house or two, and almost always to within a block. We thought that the fact it had WiFi locating capability might make it superior, but there was no sign of this in our tests.
    
3. The Active Guardian / Belle + is a bit larger than the Lively Mobile. You can see the picture below. It is also a bit heavier (2.4 oz vs 1.4oz). It did not feel especially big and clumsy, but the difference in size and weight was somewhat noticeable.
    
4. In daily useage the product has several small lights that flash periodically. So does the Lively Mobile, but the Lively lights are a little less obtrusive. Both products make it pretty clear you are wearing a "medical alert".
    
5. This product is easy to charge. You just drop it into a simple charger.
    
6. The marketing literature describes the product as "highly water resistant" and says you can wear it in the bath or shower.

*The Freeus Belle+ product we acquired was bought on Amazon, and was sold by a company called LifeStation (rebranded as the LifeStation Premium Mobile). The actual device is the same as is sold by Medical Guardian as the Active Guardian. But the monitoring service was provided by LifeStation.

We found LifeStation quite difficult to deal with. For example, to activate the product we needed to make multiple calls to the customer servce center. These calls were never answered. Instead we had to leave messages and then wait to be called back. So, we don't recommend buying the product from LifeStation, and if you like the sound of this Freeus Belle+ product, we recommend buying the Active Guardian from Medical Guardian. 

Medical Guardian's response center has already been tested in a number of our other reviews and is good, although with slower response times than GreatCall.