Around a year ago, Samsung unveiled SmartThings Family Care, an initiative aimed at caregivers who have aging people in their care. Today, the company has announced an update for Family Care, which makes using the service more convenient. Family Care has also expanded to now be available in over 200 countries worldwide, from its initial launch which was US-only.
With the update, Family Care can be easily installed even by people unfamiliar with using apps. Caregivers simply send an invitation link which includes easy guided steps to join the service.
The update also lets families define caregiver and care recipient roles more clearly, to reflect their individual preferences and circumstances. Care recipients can choose what information they want to share, and caregivers can quickly access all the necessary details within those boundaries.
From now on, if Family Care detects a care recipient hasn’t used certain appliances like the refrigerator or TV for an extended period of time, it will alert caregivers to that fact, prompting them to check in with the care recipient. They can then immediately call the person in question, or remotely activate a registered Samsung robot vacuum with a built-in camera to check the situation. The inactivity alert interval can of course be customized to one’s liking.
If care recipients use the Samsung Health app, caregivers can view details like wake-up times, bedtimes, and daily step counts.
With the care recipients’ consent, caregivers can register essential locations such as hospitals, pharmacies, supermarkets, and cultural venues to monitor their visit histories, real-time routes, and current whereabouts, helping ensure their safety when they’re out and about. This feature can also be used to track children’s journeys to and from school.
Caregivers additionally have the ability to set up important event reminders for care recipients, like regular health check-ups, hospital appointments, medication schedules, and family gatherings. These reminders will then be sent to both the caregiver and care recipient at the scheduled time.
Family Care is available on Samsung smartphones running Android 11 or newer, which have at least 3GB of RAM. All of the appliances enrolled must be made by Samsung and have support for SmartThings.