For decades, Personal Emergency Response Systems (PERS) have offered families something irreplaceable: immediate, reliable help when a loved one needs it most. This reactive safety net remains essential and continues to save lives every day. But the context around aging at home has expanded since PERS was first introduced. Older adults are living longer, caregivers are increasingly stretched thin, and families want a clearer picture of day-to-day wellbeing—not only support in urgent moments. This shift is pushing PERS providers to evolve. They’re looking for ways to engage families earlier in the aging journey, increase customer lifetime value, and strengthen their position as ongoing care partners. Wi-Fi Sensing is emerging as one of the simplest and most practical ways to do this by enhancing the PERS model without disrupting what wearables already do best.
Why PERS Providers Are Expanding Into Proactive Monitoring
Across conversations with PERS organizations, common priorities continually surface:
- Helping families stay with the service longer
- Offering tools that feel current and useful to today’s caregivers
- Supporting families earlier, not only after something goes wrong
- Being present before a fall or hospital stay—not just after
- Becoming a trusted, forward-thinking partner in keeping people safe at home
Like any device meant to be worn, emergency buttons aren’t always on 24/7—sometimes they’re set aside for comfort, removed during sleep, or simply forgotten. Even the strongest emergency-response system can only act when it’s engaged. At the same time, the physical gap between older adults and available caregivers is widening. Even from afar, families need visibility into mobility, sleep, and daily routine—not just alerts when something goes wrong. As a result, PERS providers increasingly view proactive insight as a natural extension of their core service. It fills the space between emergencies, deepens family engagement, and reinforces the value of the wearable when urgent help is needed.
How Wi-Fi Sensing Works—and Why It Complements PERS
Wi-Fi Sensing uses small, plug-in devices to interpret how Wi-Fi signals move around the home. As people go about their day, their motion subtly disrupts those signals. Advanced algorithms translate those patterns into real-time and long-term insights about activity levels, mobility, sleep, and daily routines. Because it relies on ambient Wi-Fi—not cameras, microphones, or wearables—Wi-Fi Sensing captures consistent data even when the older adult forgets their pendant or prefers not to wear one. This reveals changes that PERS can struggle to see on its own, such as:
- Declines in overall activity
- Longer periods of daytime inactivity
- Repeated nighttime disturbances
- Shifts in sleep duration
- Irregular routines emerging over days or weeks
These early indicators often show up long before falls, wandering, or hospitalizations. When surfaced to families, they create opportunities to intervene sooner and keep the older adult stable and at home. Crucially, Wi-Fi Sensing does not replace PERS. Wearables remain the fastest, most dependable way to call for help during an urgent event. Instead, the two technologies work together to create a layered safety model:
- Reactive protection: Immediate emergency response through the PERS wearable
- Proactive visibility: Continuous motion-based insight through Wi-Fi Sensing
This pairing strengthens the core PERS value proposition while meeting evolving expectations from families who want ongoing support—not just crisis response.
How Caregiver Changes the Customer Relationship
Caregiver by Cognitive shifts the PERS relationship from emergency-only contact to steady, everyday support. Instead of hearing from the provider only after a fall, families receive regular updates on mobility, sleep, and routine changes—small touchpoints that build trust and signal ongoing attention to wellbeing. This shift also broadens the market. Many families wait until after an incident to purchase a PERS device; Caregiver gives providers a way to engage them earlier with a product that feels relevant long before they believe they “need” a wearable. It turns post-crisis adoption into a preventative relationship and opens a new stream of early, recurring revenue. The technology’s simplicity often surprises providers. While motion detection through Wi-Fi may sound novel, the plug-and-play setup makes its value immediately clear and more easily accessible to seniors who can struggle with new tech. With no cameras, microphones, or user participation required, families quickly see how Caregiver complements emergency response—quiet, unobtrusive, and always working in the background.
A Scalable Path to Proactive, Continuous Safety
Caregiver integrates seamlessly into the PERS ecosystem as part of a bundled proactive-and-reactive offering, pairing continuous wellness insight with traditional emergency response. Together, they create a more complete safety model—one that delivers fast help when it’s needed most, while also providing day-to-day visibility that strengthens engagement, supports earlier intervention, and extends the value of the PERS relationship over time. Both approaches fit naturally into existing PERS workflows, with devices shipped pre-configured for simple, plug-and-play installation. This ease of deployment allows PERS organizations to move beyond emergency-only interactions and become long-term partners in safety—supporting stronger retention, earlier engagement, and families’ growing expectations for continuous visibility. With Caregiver and Wi-Fi Sensing, providers can deliver a modern, layered safety model that remains responsive when it matters most and quietly supportive the rest of the time.