Status Solution’s SARA

Status Solution’s SARA, which stands for Situational Awareness and Response Assistant, is an incredibly flexible product. It has a unique architecture which results in providing a single solution for almost all response needs – emergency response, environmental monitoring or simply as a notification tool.

Most organizations see safety and emergency response as a cost burden, especially when it is mandated by law or regulation, and look for the cheapest solution to be in compliance. Over the years, this may add up to a number of discrete systems, that do not work together, and require a lot of staff time to monitor and manage. Ultimately costing the organisation more in the long run. Using a single, automated system like Status Solution’s SARA improves response while being more cost effective.

Situational Awareness and Response Assistant

Intelligent, Rules Based Engine

The core of the system is the Status Solution’s SARA server based software that provides the intelligent rules based engine. Organizations can automate their event responses depending on the input device. Who should I notify, how should I notify – for this specific event – and program that response into the system. Once an alert from that device is received, the rule is run, automatically. No human intervention is required.

Escalations can be built into those rules. If the first notification is not acknowledged within a time you identify, the next step in the rule is initiated. This could be to notify another colleague, supervisor, manager or all of these. You can have many steps in any rule.

Wireless Mesh Positioning System

The alerts are received via wireless. Status Solution’s SARA uses a series of Wireless Repeaters strategically placed around your building and even cover exterior areas of your property. The SARA server has a network coordinator attached that can receive wireless inputs. (These are not WiFi antenna and cover a much, much larger range with fewer APs than a traditional WiFi based systems – making it far less expensive.)

SARA’s repeaters only require local power to operate. All communications are handled over wireless back to the Server. No other wiring, such as Ethernet cabling is required eliminating the need to open ceilings, add conduit and run cable. In fact, because the repeaters can be fed from a backed up power source, they can operate even if the power has failed.

Installation staff ‘map’ out your facility, storing positional (vector) information in the SARA server. When a mobile device is pressed, the ‘vector’ information associated with that device is sent to the SARA server and compared to its internal map to identify the exact position or location of the device. Fixed devices don’t require this positional information as it is pre-coded into the SARA server database.

Input Devices

SARA can be integrated into a number of existing alarm sources, such as fire panels. But this requires hard wiring. It can also support a variety of wireless alert devices which increases its flexibility and is one of the key reasons it can replace so many other emergency response tools.

These include (but are not limited to):

Life Safety

Pull Cords
Mobile Duress buttons or pendants
Wall Mounted Buttons
Bed/Chair Sensors

Environmental Monitoring

Temperature/Humidity Sensor
Harsh Environment Temperature Sensor
Water Bug/Detector
Motion Detector
Door/Window Transmitter
Cigarette Buster
Power On/Off Monitor
Universal (Relay) Transmitter

Notification Capabilities

Last but not least, SARA can provide and integrate with a large number of communications media and devices to notify of an alert or update people on valuable information. For example, SARA can send a pre-recorded voice message to a telephone, a text, email, pre-recorded message over a paging system and more. You may not need or want to use all these but it has the flexibility. Here is a selection of the many different communications media SARA can integrate with:

Cordless Telephone Systems
Video paging
Wall Boards
Paging Systems
Relay Devices (turn on something else)
Radio Modules
Dome Lights
Intercom Systems

Putting it all together

The biggest advantage of SARA is that a single system can be used to monitor and manage almost everything within a facility – from individual safety to environmental monitoring. It can differentiate the type of input and apply different rules accordingly. Now a single tool can be used to provide location based support for seniors in a retirement facility or for staff mobile duress in a hospital or for providing students with emergency support on campus. Same system, different applications.

It can be used to ensure refrigerators containing expensive drugs or HVAC systems get immediate response from maintenance without disturbing other staff. Why make a highly paid, highly trained nurse record medical refrigerator temperatures in a book, when the fridge can automatically call for help directly from maintenance.

You can’t easily calculate the cost of failing to respond appropriately in the case of emergency but you can determine the costs to carry out day-to-day menial reporting and monitoring functions. In the former case the ability to provide the fastest response from the right person at the right place is the key decision criteria. In the latter, the ability to offload staff of menial but time consuming tasks that provide the return on investment. Ultimately, it is the ability to do both that makes it the ideal platform.