Please Turn On The "Fall Detection" Feature (It could save your life one day)

[JT2002TJ]

Fall positives can happen with any technology. However, a post like this, discourages people from turning it on. Hot a great idea.

People should be informed, and be aware of positives and negatives of features.

A way to mitigate this issue, is to inform your In Case of Emergency contacts (your emergency contacts that get auto notifications) that there is the potential for false alarms. This way they don't have to jump to the worst, but can be aware that something may be wrong.

 

[Mschaferny]

Reminder of aging. Young people often feel “invincible”.

I was invincible once...until I broke my femur at age 37. It really changed my life. Being a while back, I definitely coped with it, but it’s not great. Don’t break a leg or anything. Just back down and take the easy way out. Deployed, on vacation or just plain showing off, it’s not worth it.

 

[RecentlyConverted]

I was thinking about getting a S4 or S5 for my mother. I have fitted other devices for falls, but she is stubborn and won’t wear their buttons. We think she would wear the watch (SS), but my concern would be false alarms from trips where she gets up.

Do you have to manually cancel the call to emergency services ( which she will be unlikely to be able to read on the screen - plus she never follows instructions ), or would it detect her getting up and auto cancel? If so does this feature work well? Thanks for any info on this.

 

[StumpyBloke]

I was thinking about getting a S4 or S5 for my mother. I have fitted other devices for falls, but she is stubborn and won’t wear their buttons. We think she would wear the watch (SS), but my concern would be false alarms from trips where she gets up.

Do you have to manually cancel the call to emergency services ( which she will be unlikely to be able to read on the screen - plus she never follows instructions ), or would it detect her getting up and auto cancel? If so does this feature work well? Thanks for any info on this.

You have to manually cancel it. I think the screen says something like I’m okay and didn’t fall… Something along those lines.

 

[RecentlyConverted]

You have to manually cancel it. I think the screen says something like I’m okay and didn’t fall… Something along those lines.

Shame, chances are if she fell she wouldnt have her glasses on (or they could fall off), so she could never read that on the watch. I wouldnt want to have emergency services come out for a small fall, for two reasons, one not to waste their valuable time, but also if she made too many unnecessary calls the number might get blacklisted and they might not come at the time it was a real emergency.

I will send feedback to Apple. Might be a good option to have for the elderly (selectable in menu) - cancel fall emergency call when suitable movement detected after fall.

 

[MisterSavage]

Do you have to manually cancel the call to emergency services ( which she will be unlikely to be able to read on the screen - plus she never follows instructions ), or would it detect her getting up and auto cancel? If so does this feature work well? Thanks for any info on this.

I don't think it will auto cancel and you only have a certain amount of time to cancel. My mom has mentioned to me that she has accidentally triggered the fall detection before. The watch made a noise she wasn't familiar with and cancelled it when she read what was happening.

 

[jaybar]

I would rather have emergency services show up unnecessarily because the wearer could not cancel the call, then not show up when needed, because someone had no fall detection enabled.

 

[iamasmith]

Well, I enabled it, worried it would go off when running after all the warnings on the watch and then tripped at work on a stairs and went flat on my face. I guess it will have to be more serious than that to go off then

 

[jmiddel]

Mine is on, and gets triggered way too easily. It went off while raking, or shaking a mayo bottle to clean it out before recycling. It does not learn from being told that I didn’t fall.

 

[WardH]

In my experience all 911 calls will be answered. Too many false alarms may elicit a response from an official to work on solving the issue but its better than falling and laying there. In areas covered by volunteers multiple false alarms may really slow down response time. I know in our area even 911 hangup calls are followed up by the police to ensure it wasn't someone under duress.

I'm upgrading to the Series 5 from Series 3 tomorrow. Fall detection and Heart ECG are new features I feel are valuable.