When to choose it over RS-01
- Rooms with power but no data point. Older aged-care wings where pulling Cat6 to every ceiling is most of the cost. The sensor runs from a 5 V USB-C supply off a plug pack or a PoE splitter at the nearest point that has power.
- Trial homes. A handful of rooms can be fitted in an afternoon and removed just as fast, which is how the 60-day trial kit is built.
- Short-term and respite rooms where the sensing follows the resident rather than the room.
If the room has, or can cheaply get, a PoE data point, RS-01 is the simpler choice: one cable, no radio planning.
Four ways it raises a call
- Straight into an Edge Node. The sensor has a dry-contact output. Wired to a supervised input on the Edge Node EN-01 in the room or corridor, a fall or lying alarm is raised as a call on the ward display, the over-door light and staff phones exactly like a call point, with no gateway, radio network or internet in the path. Live
- LoRaWAN to the Enterprise Gateway. A LoRaWAN gateway on site carries the sensor's events, including which alarm and which bed, to the Enterprise Gateway, which displays, messages and reports them. One LoRaWAN gateway covers a building; this is how the trial kit ships. Pilot
- Wi-Fi to the Enterprise Gateway, with live tracking. On the ward Wi-Fi or LAN the Enterprise Gateway talks to each sensor directly: out-of-bed, fall and motionless states raise and clear calls without any device reconfiguration, falls-risk arming and re-escalation are handled per room, and a live radar tracker shows the person's position in the room with a 60-second motion trail, so staff can see whether the fall is in the bathroom or beside the bed. Live
- Wi-Fi direct to the node. Running the same sensor link and tracker view on the Edge Node itself, with no gateway in the path, is in development. In development
What it detects
- Falls and a person lying on the floor, from a ceiling mount between 2.3 and 3 m, covering a 2 × 2 m to 4 × 5 m area.
- Bed exit and bed presence, with more than one bed in a room.
- Room presence, dwell time in one spot, and breathing, for inactivity and welfare checks.
- No image is ever captured: it is radar point-cloud data, so it works in the dark and keeps the room private.
Honest limits
An aid to care, not a substitute for it
The sensor's own documentation says it is an auxiliary tool and cannot fully replace manual monitoring, and we say the same. Radar fall detection is tuned per room during the trial period, furniture and visitors affect it, and it reports to the nurse call system so that a person goes to the room. It is rated for indoor use between 0 and 50 °C.
A product, not a project
RS-01W is one line item per room: the sensor, its mount and power supply, the connection to the Edge Node or the LoRaWAN gateway, messaging to the platform the facility already uses, and the fall and response reports. The sensing element is a proven 60 GHz radar module; Southerly supplies, configures and supports it as part of the system. Pricing after the trial is per room per month, the same as RS-01.
The same sensor is used for fall detection for elderly people living at home.
Specifications
| Detection | Falls, lying on floor, bed exit, multi-bed presence, room presence, dwell, breathing |
|---|---|
| Sensor | Ceiling-mount 60 GHz mm-wave radar, 24 Tx / 22 Rx array; no video; IP65; 114 × 84 × 15 mm |
| Coverage | 2 × 2 m to 4 × 5 m per sensor at 2.3–3 m mounting height |
| Power | DC 5 V / 3 A over USB-C (plug pack or PoE splitter); max 9.5 W |
| Connection | Dry-contact output (60 V / 1 A) to an Edge Node input; Wi-Fi / LAN to the Enterprise Gateway with live radar tracker; LoRaWAN AU915 to the Enterprise Gateway; direct to the Edge Node in development |
| Sensing element | Milesight VS373 radar fall detection sensor, supplied and configured by Southerly |
| What's supplied | Sensor, mount, power supply, node or gateway integration, clinical messaging and reporting — one line item per room |
| Commercials | Per room per month; 60-day trial kit |
| Status | Pilot |