Product Concept
Speech Trigger
The speech trigger is an important development in the social alarm system. It will be used to call for help, and to speak to, and listen to control centre staff, from anywhere in the home or garden.

Social alarms make use of the telephone system to call for help in an emergency. A button is pressed on a special telephone which initiates an automatic telephone call to a control centre, where staff can establish the problem and send appropriate help.

Most systems include a neck or wrist-worn trigger which can be used to raise an alarm if a person has fallen, or is out of reach of the telephone. However, although the trigger sets up the automatic dialling to the control centre, and raises the alarm, staff are unable to talk to the person who needs help if they are not within close proximity of the loudspeaker on the telephone. In such a case, control centre staff may have no alternative but to call out additional assistance or the emergency services, even though this may not turn out to be necessary.

The new speech trigger will allow a person to talk to the control centre and to hear what staff are saying, even when the caller is some distance from the telephone, perhaps in the garden, or outside the back door. It will allow control centre staff to establish the problem and send appropriate help, and to reassure the person until help arrives.

How it works

 The new speech trigger contains a radio transmitter and radio receiver, and uses cordless telephone technology. If the button on the speech trigger is pressed a signal is transmitted to the social alarm phone, which automatically dials the control centre, and keeps dialling until the call gets through. When the control centre has answered the call, a duplex speech channel is opened between the user and the control centre. The user can speak into the trigger, and hear staff replying.

The speech trigger is designed to pick up speech from anyone who is wearing the pendant; it does not have to be put to the mouth. It has a loudspeaker so that the user can hear control centre staff without having to put the device to their ear.

The speech channel will remain open until closed by the control centre. If the user accidentally presses the alarm button again, perhaps in confusion, the call is not cut off.

The speech trigger has several benefits for users of social alarms. It allows control centres to identify false alarms. Sometimes alarms are triggered inadvertently by pendant wearers, as they get up out of a chair, for example.

It provides reassurance to the user outside as well as inside the home. Many falls take place just outside the house, on the steps to the door, or in a back garden when someone is taking rubbish to the bin, or bringing in fuel.

Range 100 metres (free space) - designed to cover the area of the house and close garden.
 
Pendant size length: 85 mm
width: 55 mm
depth: 20 mm
weight: 50 g
 
Battery life Separate batteries ensure that the alarm button will function if the speech battery is exhausted.
Alarm battery - 10 years
Speech battery - 120 hours standby (rechargeable)
 
Safe 21 is a pan-European research and development project which aims to take social alarms into the 21st century. It is run by a consortium of 8 organisations with financial support from the European Commission.

Safe 21 will demonstrate how the existing social alarm infrastructure can be used to deliver a much broader range of services for people who are living alone. The project runs 1997-1999 with trials of equipment from late 1998.
Safe 21 Partners Tunstall Telecom United Kingdom
  Sintel Spain
  RGB Medical Devices Spain
  Institute for Rehabilitation Research (iRv) The Netherlands
  Hulpnet The Netherlands
  KITTZ The Netherlands>
  Rigel Belgium
  WS Atkins Consultants United Kingdom