A bedside monitor carries sound from one room to another. It does not tell you what the sound means, and it is not a medical alarm. Its only job is to let an adult hear the person in the bed from somewhere else in the house. Setting it up well takes less than an hour, but the test matters more than the setup, because a monitor that works in the living room may not work from the bathroom door at two in the morning.
Local option: New Plan Care gives families in the St. Louis area in-home help so a parent can stay home: companionship, help with bathing and dressing, meals, and overnight care. Call (314) 405-0887.
Choose where the parent unit sits
Place the unit where your parent's voice carries best, not where the cord reaches most easily. Keep it away from heavy metal, from a microwave, and from a bath fan or furnace vent if you can. If the unit has a video feed, check that the camera angle lets someone see the bed and the floor beside it without turning on a light.
Walk the route with the doors as they are at night
With your parent's room set up the way it will be overnight, carry the receiver through the house and stop at each place an adult will actually stand or sleep. Test from the bed where the person rests, from the bathroom door, from the bottom of the stairs, from the kitchen, and from the bedroom of whoever is on call. Keep the doors in their night positions. A closed door can cut the sound more than a wall does.
Test the volume at night level
Ask someone to speak in the same quiet voice your parent uses. Listen from the other room with the furnace, the fan, and the refrigerator running, since those are the sounds you will hear all night. Adjust the receiver volume so a quiet voice is clear without turning the unit up so high that every noise fills the room.
Check the power and the battery
Plug both units into outlets that cannot be knocked loose by a passing foot or a cord. Learn what the low-battery indicator looks like and how long the unit runs on its battery. If the unit uses replaceable batteries, keep a spare where the person on call can reach it in the dark.
Name who listens and what they do
Decide which adult answers the receiver on which nights, and write it on the receiver or the wall beside it. Agree on the next step in advance: go and look, call the hospice on-call line, or call 911 in an emergency. The monitor does not replace any of those calls. Keep the hospice on-call number on the same wall as the receiver so no one has to search for it at night.
Log the first nights without interpreting them
For the first few nights, the person on call should write down the time and what they heard, in plain words, without deciding what it means. If a sound is unfamiliar, bring the list to the hospice nurse and ask. That question belongs with the nurse, who can be reached at any hour, rather than with the monitor.