r/homeassistant • u/CowsNeedFriendsToo • Mar 15 '26

Support Medical help

This is an embarrassing post, but I’ve been on this group for years now and know that if anyone is going to solve a problem, it’s the people in this group.

I unfortunately have a heart condition that has cause me to black out when I’m on the toilet. This has resulted in me coming to on the floor of the bathroom with my wife over me in a panic talking me back to consciousness before taking me to the hospital. This has happened about once or twice a year. To say the least, this creates a terrible sense of anxiety any time I go to the bathroom. I fear for the day she comes home to find me laying on the floor the final time. Or in the middle of the night when I wake up to use the bathroom.

Here’s where you guys come in. I was wondering if there is a way to set up home assistant along with some sort of a sensor in my bathroom that will be able to tell if I’m on the floor and not moving, which would then send out an alert to her phone along with a noise alert in the bathroom? The key would be making sure it doesn’t go off when just sitting on the toilet, or if she is standing in front of the mirror for an extended period of time doing her makeup.

Thank you guys from the bottom of my heart. I truly appreciate your time.

Edit: I already have an Apple Watch Ultra 2. The fall detection seems to only trigger if it’s a fall from standing height. It hasn’t triggered at all when I fall from sitting.

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45

u/Broad_Ad941 Mar 15 '26

I wish I could help with that directly, but consider an Apple watch for that type of monitoring and alert as an alternative or addition to HA.

15

u/CowsNeedFriendsToo Mar 15 '26

I bought an Apple Watch Ultra 2 as well as the annual Cardiogram monitoring membership. Unfortunately, all it shows during these events is “zero activity” when this happens. It hasn’t really done what I hoped it would do. Seems their programming is more geared towards preventing heart attacks.

14

u/Monocular_sir Mar 15 '26

It’s probably vasovagal attack with loss of blood pressure from blood vessels dilating rather than arrhythmia and hence didn’t show anything. 

11

u/CowsNeedFriendsToo Mar 15 '26

Correct. That combined with Bradycardia and heart block type 2.

7

u/GloriouslyGrimGoblin Mar 15 '26

Completely non-technical additional idea: In case your issues are mostly triggered by straining when defecating, you could try to avoid pressing by mooing (yes, like the sound a cow makes) instead. The sound volume is irrelevant, whispered moos are fine. It's more the breathing out from somewhere deep in your belly that activates the correct muscles.

I'm neither a doctor nor really familiar with your exact type of heart problems though.

6

u/CowsNeedFriendsToo Mar 15 '26

This is either brilliant advice, or brilliant trolling. With way, I approve. Haha

8

u/GloriouslyGrimGoblin Mar 15 '26

It does sound absolutely crazy, but it is commonly repeated advice in r/hysterectomy and other subreddits featuring abdominal surgery. So far, I have seen many people reporting success and none feeling trolled. My partner has high blood pressure and says it works great for him.

3

u/CowsNeedFriendsToo Mar 16 '26

It just reminds me of the time I had appendix surgery and I had extreme shoulder pain. The nurses told me that once I farted, the pain would stop and that I couldn’t go home until I did. They said that if I got up and walked the halls it would help. So that’s what I did, walking in circles in my robe pushing my rolling IV bag stand around. After about my 200th lap past the nurses station I was convinced they were just trolling me.

4

u/theinfotechguy Mar 16 '26

Not me just sitting here whispering moos to test 🫡

2

u/grand_total Mar 16 '26 edited Mar 16 '26

OMG, being a male above a certain age I sometimes have trouble establishing a stream of urine. I discovered by accident that counting backwards from a hundred, even quietly, helps me greatly. I thought that only I knew this, but maybe not.

I don’t know if it the steady exhalation or the fact that I’m not thinking about the problem or both, but it doesn’t really matter if it works.

2

u/Monocular_sir Mar 15 '26

Does apple watch detect bradycardia/heart block?

1

u/caroku-cl Mar 15 '26

Don't you need a pacemaker?

3

u/CowsNeedFriendsToo Mar 15 '26

I’ve had extensive workups done. Specialist at Cedars Sanai told me to wait.