Safe Zone

A safe zone is a geographical boundary that caregivers can set up around a familiar location — typically the family home, but sometimes also a day centre, a relative's house, or another regularly visited place. When the phone or tracker the person with dementia carries reports a position outside this boundary, their caregivers receive an automatic alert.

Safe zones are a practical tool for families concerned about wandering, which is common in dementia. Rather than restricting a person's movement or requiring constant physical supervision, safe zones add a layer of reassurance: the person can move freely within a familiar area, and the family can be told if their phone or tracker reports from beyond it.

Setting up a safe zone is straightforward. Caregivers define the centre point and radius of the zone on a map (for example, a 200-metre radius around the family home). The phone or tracker then reports its position from time to time, and an alert is sent if it reports from outside the boundary. Good systems go easy on the battery by reporting after the device has moved a meaningful distance, rather than keeping GPS running all the time.

Safe zones are most effective as part of a broader safety strategy that also includes ensuring the person carries identification, maintaining a consistent daily routine, securing doors and exits appropriately, and having a plan in place for what to do if your loved one does leave their safe zone.

In OurTurn, location is shared only after your loved one says yes on their own phone, and they can pause it at any time. You can mark as many safe zones as you need, each with its own name and radius, and everyone in the family who has safety alerts switched on gets a notification in the OurTurn Caregiver app when the phone reports a position outside all of them. An alert depends on the phone being with them, switched on and connected — so an alert, or no alert, never tells you on its own that someone is safe.