42Gears Ensures Prompt Help For Seniors During COVID-19 Pandemic

No matter one’s age or background, living through the era of COVID-19 is a harrowing experience. It is especially difficult for the elderly, who typically have worse prognoses than other demographics if they contract the disease. 

For their safety, and the safety of their families, elderly individuals need to avoid contact with their families during periods of quarantine. Senior individuals might live alone or in care facilities. Several well-publicized incidents have shown the stress inherent to group homes, where infections can spread rapidly. 

The stresses of seniors living alone are less prominent, but no less dire. Under normal circumstances, seniors who live alone will typically see their families regularly- or at the very least, if they need something, their family can either arrive or coordinate help. Under quarantine, seniors cannot rely on their families’ in-person assistance- at the precise time as their needs become more dire due to the risk of COVID-19. 

One solution is to provide live-alone seniors with smartphones, so that they can contact their families at any time. For seniors with low levels of technological literacy, however, smartphones can be perplexing rather than useful. If someone needs to call for help, they need a foolproof way to contact emergency services. This is where 42Gears’ unified endpoint management software, SureMDM, can help. 

42Gears is honored to be of use to senior care providers during this time, as they use SureMDM to make tablets into single-use devices suitable for seniors. A number of firms that provide in-home tools to live-alone seniors have called on SureMDM’s help, and the number will likely increase as the impact of COVID-19 spreads. 

In particular, senior care firms utilize 42Gears’ device lockdown solution, SureLock, which is included with licenses of SureMDM. The firms provide seniors with tablets that have been locked down to just one application- for example, the telecommunication app Zoom. Seniors do not need to worry about switching between applications or dealing with the tablet interface, letting them reach their families (or emergency services) quickly. 

SureMDM licenses include another tool that may be useful for seniors- SureFox, a secure browser application that can be restricted to only specific websites. If seniors would like to visit specific websites for news updates on a regular basis, SureFox can facilitate directed web browsing. Senior care firms also employ SureMDM as a cost-saving measure. SureMDM ensures that the tablets stay connected to Wi-Fi whenever possible, thereby minimizing data consumption costs. 

Beyond this specific scenario, there are many groups of people of any age who need secure, locked-down devices to make urgent calls

If you are a caretaker, or work with a caretaking organization, and you would like to learn more, please visit www.42gears.com today.