A simple radio for someone living with dementia

When the radio becomes hard to use

For many people, the radio is part of the day: the news with breakfast, music in the afternoon. As memory gets harder, the radio is often one of the first things to go wrong. Not because they stop wanting it, but because it asks too much of them.

• A volume knob turned down by accident, and the radio seems broken.
• A station lost after a power cut, and no way to find it again.
• Radio apps with menus, search bars, ads and sign-in pages, where one wrong tap leads somewhere new.
• Remotes, standby lights and buttons that do two things.

Each of these ends with the same phone call: “The radio is broken again.” Usually, it isn’t.

What makes a radio easier to use with memory loss

There is no single right radio, but the ones that keep working the longest have a few things in common. They’re worth looking for, whichever radio you choose:

• One action to listen: press a button and it plays. No power button, no tuning, no menu.
• Few choices: two or three stations, each on its own button.
• Clear labels: big words and strong colours, so “the green one” is enough.
• A volume that can’t go silent, so it never looks broken.
• Nothing to get lost in: no screens that change, nothing that opens by itself.
• The same place every day: plugged in, next to their chair.
• Someone who can fix it from afar, so a small problem doesn’t wait for the next visit.

How Home Station radio does it

Home Station radio is an app for a spare Android phone or tablet. It shows one screen, and nothing else.

• Three big colour buttons, each named in words: “News”, “Music”, or whatever you type. A tap plays the station, and the radio says out loud what’s playing.
• Quieter and Louder, between a lowest and a loudest volume you choose. It never drops to nothing.
• A STOP button. Tapping the station that’s playing doesn’t restart it, so a second tap does no harm.
• The back button always leads back to the radio, and the settings are behind a PIN only the family knows.
• No ads, no sign-in, nothing to buy. Ever.

Everything else happens on your phone. You choose the stations, change them whenever you like, and see that the radio is online, what’s playing and when they last listened.

Help from wherever you are

When you live hours away, the hardest part is not knowing. Home Station radio tells you.

• An email or a notification if the radio goes offline or a station stops, and another when it’s back to normal.
• “Fix it”, for the day they call to say it’s broken: one tap turns the volume back up and restarts the radio.
• Voice messages: record a few words on your phone, and the Family button says “New message” until they listen.
• Brothers and sisters can help too, for free, each from their own phone.

Setting it up for a parent with memory loss

Set it up during a visit. It takes one sitting, and from then on you look after it from home.

1. Choose a spot, and keep it

   Next to their chair or their bed, plugged in, on a stand. The same place every day helps the radio become part of the routine.

2. Choose stations they know

   The station they’ve listened to for years, the music of the years they remember, the news in their own language. Familiar voices matter more than choice.

3. Name the buttons in their words

   “Morning news”, “Old songs”, “Messages from Anna”: what they would call it, not what the station calls itself.

4. Turn on the alerts

   So you hear about a problem before they have to call you.

If it’s a spare phone, remove the apps it doesn’t need, so nothing else rings or pops up over the radio.

What it is, and what it isn’t

Home Station radio is a radio, made to be simple. It isn’t a medical device or a treatment, and it doesn’t replace care. It runs on Android 7 or newer and needs Wi-Fi or mobile data. You look after it from any phone or computer, iPhone included.