MobileHelp Unveils an "OnStar" for Humans

Having an elderly parent living on their own can be a nerve-wracking experience.  But now there's a service that will let you keep track of them from your web browser between check-in calls.

Personal GPS tracking systems have been on the market for a few years, as have GPS-enabled cell phones.  But most medical alert systems have remained tethered to the house of the person being monitored. A  new medical alert system displayed at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week has taken the sort of technology applied to driver assistance systems like General Motor's OnStar and brought it down to a personal level.

MobileHelp, from Medical Mobile Monitoring, provides users of medical alert systems with nationwide coverage, not just when they're alone at home, providing people with chronic medical problems the ability to get out and feel secure wherever they go.

Starting at $35 a month, the service provides 24-hour medical monitoring and web-based location tracking. Friends and relatives can track the position of the subscriber any time from their web browser. And with the push of a button on a portable cellular device, the subscriber gets an immediate 2-way voice connection to a central monitoring station.

CNET's Elizabeth Armstrong Moore called the service's capabilities "inherently creepy and inherently useful," and compared it to another similar service recently launched, EMSeeQ, which is worn like a watch. However, EMSeeQ doesn't provide the two-way communications, and is worn like , and—as Moore said, "the faceless black watch has the unfortunate effect of looking like something Batman or a secret agent would wear."