'Tech-led social care pilot has helped my mum to get her independence back after a fall - the Mayor of the West Midlands was very impressed'
It was in June 2023 that my mum Diane suffered a nasty fall in our back garden which left her lying in agony with a broken wrist and with no one to call to.
I had no idea what was happening, because at the time, I was at work, and it was only after a phone call from our neighbour that I realised what had happened.
It's a scary and very sobering thought that if I or my brother had both been far away at the time and no one had heard Mum's calls for help, she could have laid there for hours or even days in agony.
It's also a scenario that could happen to anyone across the region, from older people who are unsteady on their feet or suffering from age-related illnesses to people with limited mobility or who require extra care around their homes.
One solution which has been trialled across the West Midlands and fully launched in Wolverhampton is the West Midlands Technology Enabled Care (TEC) programme, which helps residents access innovative technology that provides everyday support.
Wolverhampton Council has commissioned tech supplier Alcove to deliver the service over the next two years, while a long term partnership offer for the city is developed.
The service had been trialled over the last year by a number of people across the city, including my mum, with our house fitted with sensor devices and voice activated wireless technologies including fall detectors, heat sensors and remote monitoring sensors.
It was a way of giving mum her independence back after the fall, which left her in plaster for several months, as she found that she had been isolating herself more through not leaving the house.
As someone who had worked with older people through her working life, it also gave a chance to understand the possibility of a degeneration in her life, being in her seventies, but also evaluate the equipment and feedback to Wolverhampton Council of the usefulness of the system.
The West Midlands Technology Enabled Care programme is being delivered for Mayor Richard Parker and the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) by WM5G in partnership with the adult social care teams at Wolverhampton, Coventry and Birmingham councils.
As part of the Mayor's work to understand more about it, he joined Wolverhampton Council leader Steven Simkins, Rachel Murphy (deputy director for adult social care for Wolverhampton Council), Suzanne Cash (Assistive Technologies development manager for Wolverhampton Council) and Robert Franks (Managing director of WM5G) to visit our home on Friday and talk to mum about the system and learn more from her about how it had changed her life.
