GPS Tracker for Dementia Patients in India: Wandering, Safe Zones and What Actually Works

The short answer

For a parent living with dementia, the tracker that works is the one that is still on them when they walk out of the door. That rules out anything they have to remember to carry. Look for five things: it is worn on the wrist and comfortable enough to forget; it has its own SIM so it works beyond the front gate without a phone; it tells you the moment it comes off, because people with dementia take things off; it can alert you when they leave a safe zone such as the colony or the lane to the temple; and it needs nothing from the wearer, not a button press, not a menu. The Kavach Band was built around exactly that list, and we will be honest below about what it does and does not do. Whatever you buy, pair it with a written plan for the day they wander, because the device buys you minutes and the plan uses them.

Why wandering is the problem to plan for

About 8.8 million Indians over 60 live with dementia, 7.4 percent of that age group, according to the 2023 LASI-DAD study led by AIIMS New Delhi and the University of Southern California; the Dementia India Alliance puts the number at one crore. The Alzheimer's Association estimates that six in ten people living with dementia will wander at least once, and many do it repeatedly. In India the pattern is familiar to any caregiver: a father who has walked to the same mosque or temple for forty years takes one wrong turn, a mother sets out for the market in the afternoon heat and cannot remember the way back, a parent gets off a bus two stops early. In the early stages they are still mobile, still independent, and still convinced they know the way. That is the stage a tracker is for.

Four ways to track, and why three of them fail for dementia

Every option below is sold as a tracker. Only one is designed for a person who may not cooperate with it.

What matters specifically for dementia

Worn, not carried. A phone is forgotten; a pendant is taken off and put in a drawer; a tag is in yesterday's kurta. A band on the wrist goes where they go. Removal alert. People with dementia remove things, sometimes repeatedly, sometimes with surprising determination. A tracker that goes quiet when it comes off has failed silently. The band tells the family the moment it leaves the wrist, which also tells you where it came off. Safe zones. You do not want to watch a map all day; you want a notification when your mother leaves the colony or when your father is not back from the mosque by the usual time. Draw the zones once. No wearer action. An SOS button is useful for an elderly parent who understands it; a parent with dementia may not press it, so the alerts must come from location, removal and falls, not from the wearer. Falls. People with dementia fall more often; a device that notices a fall and raises the alarm itself matters. Charging. There is no week-long battery in this category, so treat the overnight charge as a caregiving task, the same as the evening tablets.

How the Kavach Band handles each of these, honestly

It weighs 28 grams and has no screen to learn; the only thing on it is a button that most wearers with dementia will never press, and that is fine. The SIM is fitted at the factory and paid for by Kavach, so there is nothing to buy or recharge, ever. If the band is taken off the wrist, the family is told. Safe zones live in the Kavach Care app: draw up to five on the Safety Plan, such as home, the lane to the temple and the daughter's flat, and the family is alerted on exit. Location is reported every ten minutes by default; Go Live switches to every minute for 30 minutes when you are actually looking for someone. If the band senses a fall it counts down for 30 seconds and then raises an SOS on its own; this is tested, not certified. Now the limits. We have not tested the band with people living with dementia, and we will not claim we have. Indoors it falls back to WiFi and mobile-cell positioning, which is less precise than GPS. At the default interval a brisk walker can cover half a kilometre between reports, which is why Go Live exists. It runs up to 24 hours on a charge, about ten with GPS reporting every ten minutes, so it is charged every night. And it is a prototype on pre-order: nothing has shipped yet and pre-orders take no payment. Every number here is on our facts page with its source.

Earlier stage: the Kavach Watch

A parent in the early stage who still answers the phone and still walks out alone is sometimes better served by the Kavach Watch, ₹9,999 on pre-order. It makes and takes 4G calls limited to the numbers you save, so a stranger cannot call it and your father cannot dial a wrong number, and it sends an SOS with location on a three-second hold of the side key before dialling the family in turn. It reports location to the same app and uses the same safe zones. It does not tell you when it comes off the wrist, which is why the band remains our recommendation once removal becomes a pattern.

The plan for the day they wander

Write this down and stick it inside the kitchen cupboard, because you will not think clearly when it happens. First, open the app and press Go Live; if the band shows a last location, go there now with a photo on your phone. Second, call 112, India's emergency number, and the nearest police station; there is no waiting period to report a missing adult, and a vulnerable adult is treated as urgent. Give the latest photo, height, what they were wearing this morning and any medical condition. Third, send the photo to the building WhatsApp group, the watchman, the auto stand and the shop they visit. Fourth, check the usual routes first: the place of worship, the old house, the market, the bus stop they used for years. Fifth, if the app shows the band is off the wrist, go to the place it came off, because that is where they were last. Useful numbers: Elderline 14567, the national senior citizens helpline, 8 am to 8 pm every day; the National Dementia Support Line of the Dementia India Alliance, +91 8585 990 990, weekdays 9 am to 5 pm. Keep both saved in every family member's phone.

Prevention that costs nothing

A laminated card in every pocket with their name, your number and the words 'I have memory loss, please call my family'; our free emergency card prints in two minutes. Your number written inside the collar of the kurtas they wear outside. A photo taken every month, because the one on the Aadhaar card is ten years old. A chime on the front door. A standing arrangement with the watchman and the neighbours that a parent leaving alone after dark gets a phone call to you. None of this replaces a tracker, and a tracker replaces none of this.

What it costs

The Kavach Band is ₹5,999 early-bird with three months of the Safety Plan included, or ₹6,999 with a full year of the plan. SOS and the removed-band alert are free for the life of the band. Safe zones, live location and the seven-day history are on the Safety Plan, ₹149 a month or ₹1,299 a year, and a plan never gates an alarm. The Kavach Watch is ₹9,999 on pre-order. Pre-orders take no payment and can be cancelled until launch. For comparison, a Bluetooth tag is cheap but useless outside a crowd, and a phone-based plan costs whatever your parent's phone costs plus the thing you cannot buy, which is their remembering to carry it.

Questions people ask

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