Voice-extending emergency response system
View Patent ↗A system for providing emergency services in which a voice pendant provides voice signals to a corresponding radio-based voice-enabled base station which either (1) acoustically forwards the voice signals on to an existing base station or (2) forwards the voice signals on to an existing base station via a communications link. The existing base station is triggered by a triggering signal that is learned by the radio-based voice-enabled base station by either DTMF programming or by receiving the triggering signal from an existing pendant while in a learning mode.
1. An emergency dialer base station for controlling an external emergency dialer, the base station comprising:
circuitry for setting the emergency dialer base station into a learning mode;
circuitry for receiving, while the emergency dialer base station is set to the learning mode, information corresponding to a triggering signal configured to be received by the external emergency dialer when a button on a non-voice-enabled pendant has been pressed,
wherein the triggering signal uniquely identifies the non-voice-enabled pendant from other non-voice-enabled pendants;
a memory for storing an indication of the triggering signal configured to be received by the external emergency dialer while the emergency dialer base station is set to the learning mode;
a receiver for receiving an activation signal from a voice-enabled pendant;
a transmitter for transmitting the triggering signal learned while the emergency dialer base station was set to the learning mode to the external emergency dialer in response to receiving the activation signal from the voice-enabled pendant; and
circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by a remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer,
wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by the remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer further comprises a speakerphone configured for acoustically transmitting the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to the external emergency dialer.
2. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises radio receiving circuitry for receiving the triggering signal from the non-voice-enabled pendant.
3. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 2 , further comprising a multi-position switch for identifying a transmission characteristic of the triggering signal.
4. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises DTMF tone receiving circuitry for receiving a pendant identifier corresponding to the non-voice-enabled pendant.
5. The base station as claimed in claim 3 , wherein the DTMF tone receiving circuitry comprises circuitry for receiving the pendant identifier from the remote monitoring service over a telephone network.
6. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by the remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer comprises circuitry for detecting that the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant are also being received by the speakerphone and for stopping acoustic transmission to the external emergency dialer of the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant.
7. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a switch for detecting that the emergency dialer base station is to learn the triggering signal.
8. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 7 , wherein the switch comprises a DTMF detector for identifying a transmission characteristic of the triggering signal.
9. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 7 , wherein the switch comprises a modem communications detector for identifying a transmission characteristic of the triggering signal.
10. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a power connector for providing power to the external emergency dialer.
11. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a power connector for providing power to the external emergency dialer from a battery backup within the emergency dialer base station.
12. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises circuitry for receiving a pendant identifier corresponding to the non-voice-enabled pendant via modem communications.
13. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the memory for storing the indication of the triggering signal configured to be received by the external emergency dialer comprises a memory for storing pairs of a triggering signal and an activation signal and further comprising:
circuitry for determining which triggering signal of the pairs stored in memory should be transmitted in response to a received activation signal; and
circuitry for passing the determined triggering signal from the memory to the transmitter for transmitting the triggering signal such that a single base station can emulate plural non-voice-enabled pendants.
14. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises radio receiving circuitry for receiving radio signals on plural frequencies and circuitry for determining on which of the plural frequencies the triggering signal is received from the non-voice-enabled pendant.
15. The base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises radio receiving circuitry for receiving radio signals encoded using plural encoding methods and circuitry for determining which of the plural encoding methods encoded the triggering signal received from the non-voice-enabled pendant.
16. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant comprises an inductive coupler on an exterior of a telephone line for transmitting the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to the remote monitoring service via the telephone line.
17. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a microphone, wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by the remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer comprises circuitry for detecting that the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant are also being received by the microphone and for stopping acoustic transmission to the external emergency dialer of the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant.
18. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , further comprising a microphone, wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by the remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer comprises circuitry for detecting that the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant are also being received by the microphone and for blocking transmission of voice signals acoustically received by the external emergency dialer from being transmitted to the remote monitoring service.
19. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the circuitry for converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by the remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer comprises circuitry for cancelling at least one of feedback, echo and distortion caused by receiving the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant and voice signals from the external emergency dialer.
20. The emergency dialer base station as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the triggering signal uniquely identifies the non-voice-enabled pendant from other non-voice-enabled pendants using a pendant ID.
21. An emergency dialing method comprising:
setting the emergency dialer base station into a learning mode;
receiving, while the emergency dialer base station is set to the learning mode, information corresponding to a triggering signal configured to be received by an external emergency dialer when a button on a non-voice-enabled pendant has been pressed,
wherein the triggering signal uniquely identifies the non-voice-enabled pendant from other non-voice-enabled pendants;
storing an indication of the triggering signal configured to be received by the external emergency dialer while the emergency dialer base station is set to the learning mode;
receiving an activation signal from a voice-enabled pendant;
transmitting the triggering signal learned while the emergency dialer base station was set to the learning mode to the external emergency dialer in response to receiving the activation signal from the voice-enabled pendant; and
converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to signals to be received by a remote monitoring service communicating with the external emergency dialer,
wherein converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant further comprises acoustically transmitting the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to the external emergency dialer via a speakerphone.
22. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises at least one of (1) receiving the triggering signal from the non-voice-enabled pendant and (2) receiving a pendant identifier corresponding to the non-voice-enabled pendant using DTMF tones.
23. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising detecting that the emergency dialer base station is to learn the triggering signal.
24. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising identifying a transmission characteristic of the triggering signal.
25. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising detecting using DTMF tones that the emergency dialer base station is to learn the triggering signal.
26. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising providing power from the base station to the external emergency dialer.
27. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising providing power from a battery backup within the base station to the external emergency dialer.
28. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises receiving a pendant identifier corresponding to the non-voice-enabled pendant via modem communications.
29. The method as claimed in claim 21 , further comprising detecting using modem communications that the emergency dialer base station is to learn the triggering signal.
30. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises receiving a pendant identifier corresponding to the non-voice-enabled pendant from a remote monitoring service using DTMF tones over a telephone network.
31. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises receiving radio signals on plural frequencies and determining on which of the plural frequencies the triggering signal is received from the non-voice-enabled pendant.
32. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein receiving information corresponding to the triggering signal comprises receiving radio signals encoded using plural encoding methods and determining which of the plural encoding methods encoded the triggering signal received from the non-voice-enabled pendant.
33. The method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein converting voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant comprises transmitting the voice signals received from the voice-enabled pendant to the remote monitoring service via an inductively coupled telephone line.
34. The emergency dialing method as claimed in claim 21 , wherein the triggering signal uniquely identifies the non-voice-enabled pendant from other non-voice-enabled pendants using a pendant ID.