This is a guest post by Melisa Merzitt
Smart house for people with disabilities
Many new Internet of things applications are comfort and safety oriented. They make it to where a user is able to regulate temperature and lightening in a room, manage door locks, activate signalization system, etc. With the assumption that, these applications promise its users comfort and manoeuvrability with household appliance, for people with disabilities and older people they mean essentially new level of possibilities in support of independent lifestyle.
Improvement of accessibility functions made smartphones
applicable for far more broad range of people with disabilities. A lot of
producers developed smartphones with a simpler and intuitively understandable
interface. Such devices are far more suitable for older people who faced with
difficulties at using smartphones due to impaired vision or hearing, problems
with movement and insufficient mobility. Smartphones of the kind are already used
as remotes for equipment of smart houses, smart vehicles and smart cities. They
offer people with disabilities a simple in using tool, which would make it
easier for them to move giving an
opportunity to take part in economic and social life in a more full measure.
Industry experts agree upon Internet of things has
a great potential in order to make it useful for people with disabilities. Shivpriya
Sridhar, product marketing manager of Smart+Communities+IoT company Cisco, says,
that her company is already taking well-directed efforts in order to make a fortune
out of advantages of Internet of things for people with disabilities. «We believe
that the most useful for them are going to be those applications, which are servicing
connections of household appliances to home
network and allowing users to automatically switch in and switch off such
devices on the basis of day part and other fixed preferences, she says. – an
ability to manage, for example, temperature and lightness can also be in demand among people with a mobility
impairment. Besides that, Internet of things is able to significantly improve
employment possibilities for them, make an independent life easier and improve
social integration of people with disabilities».
Internet of things may greatly improve access to
medicine assistance for older people and people with disabilities. Influence of
Internet of things is going to be just enormous and, as a result, a patient will
no longer go to a doctor, on the contrary, a doctor will come to a patient. Special
sensors will follow a patient`s movements, medication taking, content of carbon
dioxide in the building, creating a full image for specialists of medical institution,
which will make it to where individual service will be possible and allow a
patient to lead an independent way of life. In further perspective, it will have
a favorable image of medical service cost. Ultimately, processes of standardization
and normalization on the market will lead to medical equipment and
infrastructure cost decreasing.
Home automation technologies out of all Internet
of things applications, which are able to improve life of people with
disabilities, home automation means or differently, smart house technologies are
the most promising. Home automation technologies are used cameras and sensors of
different kinds for data transfer into a smartphone, allowing it to manage
lightness and temperature in the building at the distance, control household
appliances operating, security systems and many other devices. In combination
with an accessible smartphone interface, smart house technologies embrace a
huge potential of possibilities for disabled people, improving quality and
providing independency of their way of life. There are many examples:
• Home automation applications will allow blind
people and those who barely see to manage household items operating, regulate
temperature in the building with one click on the smartphone. It is very important,
however, so these applications to be combined with a screen-reader program
using by a smartphone or other special functions.
• Smart home technologies will help people with
disordered motor function to manage everyday objects, access to which for
disabled people will be difficult due to their disease such as light
regulators, door locks and security system.
• For deaf people and those who can barely hear
home automations means will be useful in order to increase safety. A deaf person
cannot hear sounds signalizing about strangers in their homes however intellectual
system of safety is able to compensate this problem: it will direct an alarm
signal onto a phone of a user as soon as sensors fix a suspicious activity
beyond their houses.
• Besides that, smart home technologies allow children
and elderlies trustees to control everyday activity, operatively reminding
about necessity of accomplishment of this or that prescribed actions or tasks.
Several companies have already mastered
production of smart home platforms. Digital Life AT&T company is one of
such platforms including classical options such as video cameras inside the
house, remote control and temperature regulation, home light remote control, remote
water leak detention, entry door code locks and so on.
Digital life AT&T company: from conception to active applications
Taking into account special needs of elderly people
and disabled ones, Digital life was developed in order to help with leading an
independent life emergency security. For example:
• Sensors placed at the foot of the bed sets the
signal about an elderly person or a disabled one to get up.;
• Sensors inside the medicine box or a fridge
fix time and number of them being opened;
• Water leak detection sensors automatically
cover water supply in case water flood from a bath or a sink.
All these functional capabilities are getting realized
due to the net of connected sensors, which during a certain period of time gather
information in order to define a typical user every day behavior scheme. After such
a scheme to be installed, there will be little difficulty to personalize the
system, so it automatically inform relatives, curators, neighbors and other people in case of routine behavior
manners changes.
Digital life if one of a few smart home platforms available
at present time on the market, but it clearly demonstrates an Internet of
things potential for improving quality of life and ease of independent living
for elderly and disabled people.
About the author: Melisa Marzett whose current activity is writing for <a href=”http://resumeperk.com/”>resumeperk.com</a> simply enjoys the process of writing. She loves cats, French movies and classic literature along with her writing career and hopes to write a book some day.
