How Strong Wi-Fi Can Improve an Elderly Monitoring System
An elderly monitoring system can help improve the safety and care of residents. However, it's only as good as the network it's hosted on. Here's why.
Introduction
One struggle in assisted living environments is visibility and safety. There just aren’t enough healthcare workers to constantly monitor residents.
A solution, however, is elderly monitoring systems. These systems can help carers monitor their residents without physically seeing them. For example, if they fall, get out of bed, or leave the room, a nurse will be notified.
As you can imagine, this can reduce staff demand and improve the safety of residents, making it a must-have for any nursing home.
One issue, though, is that these systems are wi-fi dependent. Without good wi-fi, systems can be unstable, unresponsive, and not work for their intended use.
The Importance of Monitoring Systems in Assisted Living
Improved Safety for Residents
At a senior living facility, falls, wandering, and delayed responses are all too common.
Falls, in fact, are a serious issue with older adults. The CDC even reports that 2 million seniors are treated in emergency departments for fall-related injuries each year.
When a resident has monitoring systems, however, help is automatically notified if an issue occurs. This allows care to respond to them when they’re in need.
Why Assisted Living Facilities Need Access Controls
The need for access controls in an assisted living facility is much more important than many think. Here’s why:
Reduced Demand on Staff
Currently, there’s a huge staff shortage in U.S. nursing homes. 77% of nursing homes in our country have some type of staffing shortage.
One way we’re able to reduce the demand for staff is by using an elderly monitoring system. Instead of staff physically checking on residents constantly, they can get a snapshot of their activity via a monitoring system.
By having such a system in place, it reduces the need for staffing. This ensures that those who actually need help get the attention they need.
Increased Operational Visibility
A senior camera monitoring system also increases operational visibility. This not only helps staff monitor residents but it also helps managers oversee their operations.
For such managers, they can use these systems to monitor residents, review footage for incident reporting, and even support staff training.
Why Camera Monitoring Depends on a Strong Network
An elderly monitoring system is excellent. However, it’s only as good as the network it’s hosted on.
Continuous Uptime
Monitoring systems, either with or without cameras, rely on the internet to communicate and record in real time. Even a short, brief wi-fi outage can disrupt monitoring and alert systems, which could cause significant issues.
Full-Facility Coverage
Effective monitoring must be facility-wide. There shouldn’t be any dead spots in residents' rooms, entrances, common areas, etc. If you don’t have sufficient network coverage, then you could miss out on serious monitoring alerts.
System Reliability
You need your elderly monitoring systems to work consistently, night and day. Without solid network stability, though, even the best cameras, monitoring equipment, etc., can lag, freeze, or worse, go offline.
Building a Complete Monitoring System with Beacon
At Beacon, we can develop a network system to support your elderly monitoring system by surveying your property, designing a network, and installing it with the best equipment.
Survey
Every assisted living facility is different. Because of this, we start our wifi services with a survey. This involves evaluating floor plans, existing infrastructure, blind spots, high-traffic zones, dead zone areas, etc. We will also review your monitoring and network needs.
Installation
If you’re looking to improve your facility’s security, residents' protection, and staff workflow with access controls, contact us today. Our team will be ready to perform a survey and site assessment so we can get to designing your access control system.
Design
With such information, we can then develop a monitor and network system. This system will be specially customized to your needs and property.
Contact Us
Once the design has been approved, we’ll carry out the entire installation according to plan. We’ll take care of all the hardware, wiring, configuration, and testing. Your staff will also receive onboard training so they know how to operate the system.
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Get in Touch
We’re here to assist you with any inquiries.