Smart home

This is part of CNET's "Tech Enabled" series about the role technology plays in helping the disability community.I was sitting in an office in the back of the Centerstone mental health treatment facility in Louisville, Kentucky. Beside me were an old PC tower and a laptop, both cracked open, wires unspooled and hard drives lying under the flickering ceiling fluorescents like animal innards in a high school biology class.Two men sat across from me: Lon Moore, a Centerstone client with schizoaffective disorder, and his peer support specialist, Dante Murray, a leader in the local mental health community, who also lives with schizophrenia. To both of them, this mess of circuitry and gadgetry had been instrumental to their recovery.Dante teaches clients with mental illness basic computer literacy, which sparked Lon's passion for tinkering -- hence the deconstructed PCs. For Lon, despite battling paranoia that conventional wisdom says technology might trigger, designing basic gadgets has … [Read more...] about Meet your next therapist: the smart home

This is part of CNET's "Tech Enabled" series about the role technology plays in helping the disability community.First, Sophie Godek tried to read books with a magnifying glass. Then, she turned to a tablet to make the words on her e-books larger. Eventually, she couldn't even see that. The 95-year-old was losing her sight, and with it, one of her favorite hobbies. "She wasn't able to read anymore, and that was a big loss," said her son Jim Godek.Last year, the younger Godek had an idea: What if he could get his mom a device that could read books to her without the need to navigate a control screen that she had a hard time seeing? That device turned out to be the Amazon Echo, an internet-connected smart speaker that responds to voice commands. Jim Godek figured that he could buy his mother audiobooks from Audible, then teach her to use voice prompts to have the Echo play the audiobook.At first, Sophie Godek was a little wary."It took a little while to convince her of it," Jim Godek … [Read more...] about A smart home can help seniors maintain their independence

This is part of CNET's "Tech Enabled" series about the role technology plays in helping the disability community.Retired US Army Col. Phil Swinford skillfully maneuvers his powered wheelchair through the Polytrauma Rehabilitation Center at the McGuire VA Hospital in Richmond, Virginia. The PRC specializes in treating veterans and active-duty service members with traumatic brain injuries. But that isn't why Swinford's here.His 28-year military career ended abruptly on July 18, 2015, after a mountain biking accident resulted in an incomplete fracture of his C2 vertebra and quadriplegic paralysis. Today, he's meeting with the PRC's in-house assistive technology (AT) department for a much-needed tune-up on his chair. "Technology is great when it works, and not so great when it doesn't work, which frequently is [compounded] when I break it," Swinford says. Swinford's in luck. Smart devices might be relatively new to consumers, but the US Department of Veterans Affairs has long embraced … [Read more...] about How Amazon Echo, Control4, smart homes help injured veterans

Now Playing: Watch this: This startup wants to use smart homes for eldercare 1:44 This is part of CNET's "Tech Enabled" series about the role technology plays in helping the disability community. Allison Dean Love was getting nervous. She hadn't heard from her mother, Amelia, in a few hours. There were no emails or phone calls. No one else could get in touch with her either. Concerned, a cousin went out to Amelia Dean's 1948 ranch-style house and found the 82-year-old on the floor and dehydrated. She doesn't remember what happened, but her family estimates she'd been down there for about six hours. Love and her husband, who live in South Carolina, raced back to the small town of Columbia, Tennessee -- Love can remember every minute of that awful day like an episode of Fox television show " 24," she said. That was in November. Fast-forward to March, and Love found herself once more asking a cousin to check on Dean. This time, Dean was sitting in a chair in her living room. … [Read more...] about This smart home will help you care for seniors