Is there a CB radio that will work with 2 way handheld radios?

Xposure

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Since we have the topic of radios going I have a question. I don’t know anything about cb radios. Is there a way to get one that will work with 2 way handheld radios? My MIL is home bound and Is getting to where she can’t use her cell phone good. I was going to get a good 2 way radio that will reach a mile or so which means she can contact us at our house as well as our store.

THEN that got me wondering if I could get something that worked with a cb radio so that I could pick her up from much farther distances with a cb in the Jeep and my wife’s car. Would something like that be possible?

What ever my MIL would have needs to be something she can carry around with her as opposed to a base station type thing. She has a emergency button that calls a ambulance, but sometimes she just needs help doing something or help getting up, doesn’t really want to call an ambulance. That is where the 2 ways come in.

Also, I need to buy a cb radio for the Jeep anyway. :)
 
If she's having trouble using a cellphone, do you think she could carry around a bigger and heavier hand-held CB? Though I doubt a hand-held CB with its tiny antenna would be able to communicate a mile.
 
Since we have the topic of radios going I have a question. I don’t know anything about cb radios. Is there a way to get one that will work with 2 way handheld radios? My MIL is home bound and Is getting to where she can’t use her cell phone good. I was going to get a good 2 way radio that will reach a mile or so which means she can contact us at our house as well as our store.

THEN that got me wondering if I could get something that worked with a cb radio so that I could pick her up from much farther distances with a cb in the Jeep and my wife’s car. Would something like that be possible?

What ever my MIL would have needs to be something she can carry around with her as opposed to a base station type thing. She has a emergency button that calls a ambulance, but sometimes she just needs help doing something or help getting up, doesn’t really want to call an ambulance. That is where the 2 ways come in.

Also, I need to buy a cb radio for the Jeep anyway. :)

This is probably far enough off topic that it deserves its own post. Perhaps @Chris can help?

Surprisingly enough, I was on the phone with my father in law this morning about this very topic. My mother in law has a very rare progressive disease that is slowly paralyzing her from the waist down. She is rather stubborn and is continuing to use a walker around the house when she really should be in a wheel chair full time. This is leading to her falling quite a bit. The fear of course is that she will be home alone and hurt herself with no access to help. The other issue is that she is very slow to answer the phone, and misses most calls. She does have a cell phone but is not adept at using it, or it seems to be difficult to use. After a short brainstorming session this morning, my first solution is this system from Panasonic.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072N3T79P/?tag=wranglerorg-20

With multiple handsets, they can be spread around the house. It also acts as a two way radio throughout the system, and with a Bluetooth enabled cell phone, any call that is made to the cell phone will ring throughout the house.

Our main issue is trying to change her behavior. If she doesn't keep a phone or any kind of device on her, it's not going to help.
 
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If she's having trouble using a cellphone, do you think she could carry around a bigger and heavier hand-held CB? Though I doubt a hand-held CB with its tiny antenna would be able to communicate a mile.

It’s not really the size that’s a issue, she will probably keep it in a bag attached to her walker. It’s that she has a hard time using her cell...pushing things and can’t figure out how to get back to where she needs to be, too slow to answer it and can’t figure out how to call back. I thought a 2 way type setup may be easier where she can just push a button. Also she doesn’t have to ‘answer’ it. We can say something and she hear it then if it takes her 2 minutes to reply that’s okay. It may not be the perfect solution but I’m hoping it will work better than a phone. It’s certainly not as good as us sitting there 24x7 but we just can’t do that, we all work.
 
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This is probably far enough off topic that it deserves its own post. Perhaps @Chris can help?

Surprisingly enough, I was on the phone with my father in law this morning about this very topic. My mother in law has a very rare progressive disease that is slowly paralyzing her from the waist down. She is rather stubborn and is continuing to use a walker around the house when she really should be in a wheel chair full time. This is leading to her falling quite a bit. The fear of course is that she will be home alone and hurt herself with no access to help. The other issue is that she is very slow to answer the phone, and misses most calls. She does have a cell phone but is not adept at using it, or it seems to be difficult to use. After a short brainstorming session this morning, my first solution is this system from Panasonic.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072N3T79P/?tag=wranglerorg-20

With multiple handsets, they can be spread around the house. It also acts as a two way radio throughout the system, and with a Bluetooth enabled cell phone, any call that is made to the cell phone will ring throughout the house.

Our main issue is trying to change her behavior. If she doesn't keep a phone or any kind of device on her, it's not going to help.

We have a similar type phone that we have been using at the house but the one we got you have to read the display to select the intercom...which wasn’t a big deal until now because her vision has gotten much poorer over the past year. But my main hope currently is to get something that will reach around town. Ideally a 5-7 mile range would be great as someone in the family is just about always within that range. I think 1-2 miles would reach our store and that would be very helpful but 5-7 would be perfect.

I’ve been reading up this morning and thinking about 2 ways, maybe a smaller handheld cb with a larger antenna mounted somewhere, the GMRS stuff can go up to 50 watts but I don’t think any of its handheld stuff goes over 5 Watts.

Anyway, just brainstorming and researching and wondering if any of you guys know of a setup that would be good for something like this.
 
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what about a cell phone like this? it has 4 numbered buttons + a 911 button...you could even program all 4 of the numbered buttons to dial the same number if you had too. We were going to get this for my MIL as she progressed with Dementia, unfortunately she progress so fast that it required full time nursing home.

https://www.electronicsforce.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=55704

Yea if I can’t setup some kind of good radio setup I may get that, it would be easier than her current phone. What I’m trying to come up with is basically all of us have some type of mobile radio that can cover a 5-7 mile radius and she can just hit a button and say something and it goes to all of us at once. But it may not be a practical or work as well as I’m thinking it would be. One issue I’m trying to address is she may try calling us but we may not all can answer that right then so she goes down the list calling. It would be easier for her to just hit a button and say something and typically out of 5 or so people someone should always hear.
 
Is her cell phone a smartphone? Would something like Amazon's Alexa work, where you install an app on the phone and then she just has to speak and call you?
 
Is her cell phone a smartphone? Would something like Amazon's Alexa work, where you install an app on the phone and then she just has to speak and call you?

Her phone is a smart phone (which has become the problem over the past year)....but I haven’t thought of pairing it with some external device like your talking about. Her phone is android based but I believe there are some android based things like your talking about. I need to research those and see what kind of capabilities they can add to making and receiving phone calls. The only issue I could see about that is it wouldn’t really follow her around from room to room. Also she likes to use a walker to go outside and sit at a bench at least once a day and it wouldn’t follow her out there. As she becomes less and less mobile and mostly stays in one room this is certainly going to be a good idea for me to keep in mind. I might could set it up to do a lot of things.
 
If she's having trouble using a cellphone, do you think she could carry around a bigger and heavier hand-held CB? Though I doubt a hand-held CB with its tiny antenna would be able to communicate a mile.

I saw that you are ham licensed so you probably know more about this....with the GMRS license can you use handhelds that are more powerful than standard 2ways? For instance I was looking at a 2 way such as this Midland that seems like a standard 2 way https://www.buytwowayradios.com/midland-gxt-1000-vp4.html and it is 5w but I’m pretty sure GMRS allows for use up to 50 watt, however, I can’t find any handhelds that say they are for GMRS that are more than 5w.
 
While true it wouldn't follow her around, you can get multiple devices (I think they are called echos, I'm honestly not sure as I haven't done a lot of research on them) to go in separate rooms. It can also play music for her, turn on and off lights, etc etc..

My mother in law refuses to get a smartphone, so I'm stuck trying to figure out another plan.
 
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Serbonze has a good point.

Another idea is just get her a samsung smart watch. She can call through that if mobility is an issue.

I use mine often.
Watches and smartphones can do voice activated calling as well.
 
I know it sounds kind of wrong. But it is certain point the older we get we turn into children. Why not look for some type of baby monitoring system. I know they had Advanced greatly in the past 40 years. Some models even allow for two-way communication and cameras. If you could find one that would link to your smartphone then you don't have to worry about the other side.

Just thinking outside the box.
 
Serbonze has a good point.

Another idea is just get her a samsung smart watch. She can call through that if mobility is an issue.

I use mine often.
Watches and smartphones can do voice activated calling as well.

Can you easily answer with them? She’s getting to where she can’t see good and on top of that gets fairly easily confused. For instance she can’t ever answer her phone because she can really get the ‘slide’ right across the display. With the watch how do you answer calls? Also can you talk through the watch like it has a speaker and mic where she can talk like a speaker phone? She would also need something that’s waterproof (which I’m sure most are).
 
While true it wouldn't follow her around, you can get multiple devices (I think they are called echos, I'm honestly not sure as I haven't done a lot of research on them) to go in separate rooms. It can also play music for her, turn on and off lights, etc etc..

My mother in law refuses to get a smartphone, so I'm stuck trying to figure out another plan.

Cool, I’ll look into those and see what I can find out about those, that might be a good option.

Well my mil got a smart phone when she was a little better than now. BUT honestly, it’s been terrible for her, she just wanted what everyone else had and she has never been able to understand it. She’s always touching the screen too long and deleting apps or moving them where then she can’t find them or putting it in airplane mode, turning the ringer off....it’s always something. Every time I look at her phone it’s all messed up. She can’t figure out how to really use it, we try to make it super simple but it’s still never been good for her. She did MUCH better with her old phone that had buttons.

Oh course that just our experience, everyone is different in their abilities. It may be great for your mil.
 
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I know it sounds kind of wrong. But it is certain point the older we get we turn into children. Why not look for some type of baby monitoring system. I know they had Advanced greatly in the past 40 years. Some models even allow for two-way communication and cameras. If you could find one that would link to your smartphone then you don't have to worry about the other side.

Just thinking outside the box.

About 6m ago I mentioned that to my wife but she thought the camera might be too much with no privacy. Also, most of the ones I looked at you as the user with the phone can communicate with them but there was no good way for the person being watched to initiate conversation with you unless you leave the app open and running all the time. But I only looked into it briefly because my wife thought her mom wouldn’t like being on camera 24x7....probably right....but I suppose at this point she really wouldn’t know. LoL
 
1. Yes... it is easy to answer. There is a speaker phone on watch.. so basically you are Inspector Gadget.



2. Answering calls is with a tap or twist the bezel dial clockwise.


3. Yes it is water resistant. You can shower with it.

If this watch is a solution.. be sure to get the one that is 4gLTE capable.. and pay the extra 10 bucks a month. It allows the watch to truy act as a phone.. independent of phone.

Fyi.. I have s3 frontier.

download (4).jpeg


Screenshot_20180910-103553_Gallery.jpg


Screenshot_20180910-103800_Gallery.jpg
 
Cool, I’ll look into those and see what I can find out about those, that might be a good option.

Well my mil got a smart phone when she was a little better than now. BUT honestly, it’s been terrible for her, she just wanted what everyone else had and she has never been able to understand it. She’s always touching the screen too long and deleting apps or moving them where then she can’t find them or putting it in airplane mode, turning the ringer off....it’s always something. Every time I look at her phone it’s all messed up. She can’t figure out how to really use it, we try to make it super simple but it’s still never been good for her. She did MUCH better with her old phone that had buttons.

Oh course that just our experience, everyone is different in their abilities. It may be great for your mil.


Have you tried the phone on easy mode? Also check the accessibilty settings.

Screenshot_20180910-105108_Settings.jpg


Screenshot_20180910-105102_Settings.jpg