Elderly Care Escalation: Automated Risk Detection and Notification

Have your elderly family members ever encountered an emergency where you couldn't be reached?

To be honestevery time I see news reports about an elderly person falling and not being discovered for hoursmy heart skips a beatOur elderly relative lives aloneand although we installed camerasI always worry: what if something really happens and my phone is on silent? Recentlya friend recommended a smart elderly care systemwhich includes a skill called escalamiento (Spanish for "escalation processing")—specifically designed to address this pain point.

This skill was developed by the cuidavoz teampart of their elderly care engineering application (elderly-care-engineering-app)You can find it on GitHub under the path elderly-care-system/src/agents/skills/escalamientowhere there is a SKILL.md file explaining how to use it.

What exactly can it do?

In simple termsescalamiento is an intelligent emergency escalation dispatcherWhen various sensors in the home (such as fall detectorsheart rate wristbandsdoor sensors) detect an abnormality in the elderly personor when the elderly person themselves presses the help buttonthe system triggers an eventUpon receiving the eventthis skill notifies relevant people step by step or simultaneouslyaccording to the rules you set in advance.

• First level: Notify family members (via SMSapp pushphone call).
• Second level: If family members do not respondescalate to community caregivers or the family doctor.
• Third level: In the worst casedirectly call the emergency center.

The notification methodwaiting timeand contact information for each level can all be adjusted in the configuration fileFor exampleI set the first level to "immediately call Mom" and the second level to "if no confirmation within 5 minutesnotify the community property management."

Installation is surprisingly simple?

Even though I am a programmerinstalling this skill is truly brainlessFirstyou need theenvironment (I won't go into details on how to install it—just search online)Then open the terminalcopy the command with a snap:

npx skills add <repository-url> --skill escalamiento

In a few secondsit's pulled downand all files are in the directory elderly-care-system/src/agents/skills/escalamiento/If you want to try it out firstyou can also directly click the "Run in " button aboveand it will pop up a test sandbox.

Configuration is actually quite flexible

I spent an afternoon figuring out the configurationThe main thing is to modify a file called escalamiento.config.json (if it doesn't existcreate one referencing SKILL.md).

Here are the key points:

• channels: Configure API keys for notification channelsI used Twilio for SMS and WhatsAppplus DingTalk robotFor phone callswhich require paymentI temporarily left it unused.
• levels: Define escalation levelsEach level includes conditions (which events trigger it)contacts (who gets notified)timeout (waiting time)and next_level (if no one confirmsescalate to which level).
• events: The type identifiers of eventssuch as fall_detectedvitals_abnormalhelp_buttonThese need to be coordinated with the front-end sensor skills.

For examplemy fall scenario configuration:

{"levels": [{"name": "Notify Family""events": ["fall_detected"]"contacts": ["family_member_1""family_member_2"]"channels": ["sms""app_push"]"timeout_seconds": 300"next_level": "Notify Community Caregiver"}{"name": "Notify Community Caregiver""events": ["fall_detected"]"channels": ["phone_call""dingtalk"]"timeout_seconds": 180"next_level": "Emergency"}]
}

Note: If after the first-level notificationthe family member does not confirm within 5 minutes (the system sends a confirmation link)the skill automatically escalates to the next levelThis mechanism is especially reliable in preventing oversight.

How does it feel in practice?

Last monthI actually tested itI connected the fall detector of my elderly relative (a modified Mi Home device) to the systemthen threw myself onto a yoga mat (simulating a fall)After about 10 secondsmy phone rang with an SMS: "Your family member may have fallenPlease click to confirm." I deliberately did not clickAfter 5 minutesthe community caregiver's DingTalk group started frantically @mentioning peopleand it even automatically called the neighbor downstairs (they used a virtual number)Finallythe neighbor ran upstairs and knocked on the doorand I "woke up" to cancel the alarmThe whole process was highly automatedand the logs recorded every step—who received the notificationwhen they confirmedhow long it tookclearly