Courtesy of Laurie Orlov

So what has happened since 2009?

by Laurie Orlov

This product introduction is a great example of the risk in announcing an offering to the dementia technology space more than two years before shipping a product. Can you imagine how many phone calls were made to Foot.com (the originally-announced retailer), to Aetrex, to GTX, to Andrew Carle, for that matter, since the announcement? These calls would come from worried caregivers of the 5 million or more in the US who are believed to have dementia. How worried? Well in 2008 and 2009, Silver Alert programs were launched in at least 20 states to alert that family members have driven off and may be lost. That’s right, they are driving in cars described on flashing signs on Route 95 in Florida -- where there are an alleged 400,000 individuals living with dementia, upwards of 100,000 likely living alone - and just think, no one seems to know how many of them are driving.

What happened in the tech world since 2009 with GPS tracking? Well, for one thing, the smart phone, now with emergency response applications. But smart phone penetration today among those with dementia is likely to be far less that the 11% of the aged 65+, as surveyed in Pew Research reports. Mobile PERS devices also began appearing. Mobile Help launched in December, 2009. Active Care has one and a variety of other GPS tracking devices are available. There are smaller ones that can be pinned to the back of a shirt and some are now built in to cars. LifeComm will presumably move beyond their pre-announce stage, which took so long that Google Health had time to rise and fall.

Who will agree to be notified upon a departure from a pre-set zone? As Carolyn Rosenblatt noted in Forbes - the shoe must be accompanied by the willing caregivers keeping track of wandering seniors. Will it take off as a tech tool in assisted living communities where residents can come and go freely, even those with dementia? I wonder if these assisted living communities will knowingly agree to the real and perceived responsibility of having to stay in touch with the PC and phone-based notifications. Maybe they will respond with agreements that require family to be notified as first responder. Or maybe they will use the introduction of the GPS shoe for a resident as a clear indicator that he or she now needs to move to memory care. We will need to wait and see.

A version of this article first appeared on Laurie Orlov's blog Technology Watch published 10-16-2011