GB2374250A

GB2374250A - Personal assistance alarm and system

Info

Publication number: GB2374250A
Application number: GB0108222A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Richard Ormson
Original assignee: NEC Technologies UK Ltd
Current assignee: NEC Technologies UK Ltd
Priority date: 2001-04-02
Filing date: 2001-04-02
Publication date: 2002-10-09
Also published as: GB0108222D0

Abstract

The personal assistance alarm, which may be portable, communicates with a control centre via a cellular network. The alarm has a means for activating an alarm, such as a push button. This alarm can then be transmitted to the control centre via the cellular network.

Description

PERSONAL ASSISTANCE ALARM

This invention relates to a personal assistance alarm particularly of the hand held type.

There are many situations in which it would be useful to be able to summon help at the press of a button and the market for personal attack alarms and warden assisted housing alarms demonstrates this. There are, however, limitations on the systems currently available. Warden assisted housing alarms are either hard wired or are short range radio systems operating in the unlicensed spectrum.

In either case they are limited to the confines of the warden assisted development. Personal attack alarms generally work on the principle of activating a loud alarm associated with the unit in the hope that an attacker is scared off or that help is attracted. There is not currently available a personal alarm that will work almost anywhere and has the capability of guaranteeing that assistance is on the way.

Preferred embodiments of the present invention are based on cellular technology of the type used in mobile phone networks. Many standard parts from mobile phones can be used to build a unit which will allow the pressing of a single button to send a message to a specified number, e. g. the emergency services or a private monitoring centre, along with a unique identifier, advising that the owner of that unit requires assistance.

At present mobile phone networks do not determine the physical point of origin of a given call. However, networks are in the process of introducing systems to determine this. This could be done by the circuitry provided in the mobile phone or remotely by the network and this could also be used in an alarm unit embodying the invention. Combining this information with the alarm message would enable a monitoring centre to direct appropriate assistance to the person who requested it.

Preferred embodiments of the invention are now described in detail by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: Figure 1 shows a flow diagram of the steps which take place in a first embodiment of the invention; and Figure 2 shows a flow diagram of the steps which take place in a second embodiment of the invention.

It is envisaged that a unit about the size of a small pager would be able to contain all the electronics required to access a cellular network and to send a help message. This would use standard cellular phone components but would not require a display, a keyboard, a large battery, or a powerful processor and therefore the size would be reduced from that of a conventional mobile phone.

The processor can be reduced in size because of the very limited functionality of the device. The keyboard is not required for the same reason. The battery can be much smaller since the device only needs to be active once the button is pressed. The display can be removed as it is not needed for the device to perform its basic function.

However, it may be desirable to keep it since the unit could then also be arranged to operate as a conventional pager and also to display information from a monitoring centre advising the user that help is on the way and when it should be expected.

The above functionality could be built into a standard mobile telephone by modifying the phone's hardware or at an application level. The drawback of putting it into a standard phone is that the simplicity is sacrificed. However, the differential costs of putting it in a mobile phone would be relatively small.

Figure 1 shows a flow chart of proposed operation of the stand-alone device in an embodiment of the invention.

Generally, at step 2, the device is inactive waiting for a key press. When the alarm button is pressed by a user the device attaches to the cellular network at step 4 either using the nearest base station or the base station from

which the device is receiving the strongest signal. Once attached, the device sends an alarm message to a control centre at step 6. At step 8 the control centre asks for the location of the device. This information could be transmitted directly from the device. Alternatively, it could be information available over the cellular network.

Once received, this location information is supplied to the control centre at step 10 and help is despatched at step 12. The device remains active at step 14 until it is deactivated by the control centre. This allows tracking, in case the person who activated the alarm moves location.

The embodiment shown in figure 2 is slightly different in that in this, the device is permanently in contact with the network. Initially the device will attach to the cellular network at step 16 and will then move into an inactive state at 18 until such time as a user presses as alarm button. At that point, the device will send alarm message to a control centre at step 20.

Steps 22-28 are then the same as steps 8-14 of figure 1.

This embodiment uses more power since the permanent registration with the network requires the unit to perform all the monitoring activities normally associated with this. However, the help message can be sent out instantly thereby saving some time.

Figure 3 shows an embodiment of the invention in its simplest form. The unit is housed in a casing 30. This has on its front a display 32 which can display messages received from the control centre. The unit is activated by a power switch 34. An alarm button 36 is used to activate the alarm and send an alarm message to the control centre. When the power button is activated then the device can go through all the steps illustrated in either figure 1 or figure 2. The alarm button is coupled to an internal processor which causes the unit to send signals to the control centre via the cellular network when the alarm button is pressed.

The possibility of malicious or inappropriate calls being sent from units such as this means that it is unlikely that the system would be used by the emergency services. This is also a problem because the one press approach is unsuitable for specifying which service is required. The unit could be modified to specify which service. However, generally some additional information is required by the emergency services before help can be despatched. Further sophistication could be incorporated but this would lead to an increase in the size of the device.

The system is most likely to be used by subscription based private systems. Malicious calls are much less likely on a subscription system since on these types of systems it is normal to have penalties associated with false alarms.

The invention could be particularly useful for example for elderly and persons at risk of physical attack. There is the possibility of linking the device to medical monitoring equipment which could be arranged automatically to generate an alarm and summon help if certain events occur.

Claims

CLAIMS 1. A personal assistance alarm comprising means for communicating with a cellular network, means for activating an alarm, and means for transmitting the alarm signal to a control centre via the cellular network.
2. A personal assistance alarm according to claim 1 in which the alarm is a portable alarm.
3. A personal assistance alarm according to claim 2 in which the portable unit includes a means for determining the location of a portable unit and transmitting this to the control centre.
4. A personal assistance alarm according to claim 2 in which the control centre is able to determine the location of the portable assistance alarm once it has received an alarm signal.
5. A personal assistance alarm system comprising a control centre at least one portable personal assistance alarm, and a cellular network over which the personal assistance alarm can communicate with the control centre, the personal assistance alarm comprising means to communicate with the cellular network, and means to send an alarm signal to the control centre, the system including means to determine the location of the device sending the alarm.
6. A system according to claim 5 in which the personal assistance alarm attaches to the cellular network on activation of the alarm.
7. A system according to claim 5 in which a device is permanently attached to the cellular network.
8. A personal assistance alarm system substantially as herein described.
9. A personal assistance alarm substantially as herein described.