Using a Logitech Harmony Hub to remotely control an old person’s television

My mother has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and is being maintained in her home with the help of carers who visit her twice a day and family members who visit her on a less frequent basis. More and more she is having trouble operating her television and is struggling to figure out how to fix things when they don’t work the way she expects them to. In this post I describe how I use a Logitech Harmony Hub to remotely control my mother’s television.

 

 

About a year ago, and after my mother had spent a few weeks in a nursing home, I decided to automate as many things as I could to make it easier for her to cope in reasonable comfort. One of the things I did was to install a Logitech Harmony Hub universal remote control to allow me to control her television remotely. Using a smart phone or tablet I can sort things out using the Harmony app and get her back to a point where she can control the television with the remote control for the television which she is familiar with. She just has to ring me up and I can take control. The calls are getting more frequent but I don’t mind.

 

I originally bought the Harmony Hub as a way of automating Skype so I could have video calls with my mother. It allows me to switch the inputs to the television to connect it to a mini PC running Skype. After the call has finished, I can switch the television back to its original state. Now I’m finding it really useful to just be able to give my mother a hand when she gets stuck.

If you live in the UK, and specifically Hampshire, Berkshire or Surrey,  Smart Life Solutions offers a Universal Remote Control Setup Service to install and configure the Logitech Harmony Hub in your, or your elderly relative’s, home.

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