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The Doona SensAlert is also available on Amazon from Doona’s official Amazon Store
Every parent’s worst nightmare? Forgetting their little one in the car. With the hustle and bustle of daily life, such harrowing incidents, unfortunately, have made headlines all too often. But what if there was a technological guardian angel that ensured your child’s safety even when your mind was elsewhere? Introducing the Doona SensAlert.
The Doona SensAlert is a padded safety device placed under your child in a car seat or booster (not just Doona products). It connects with a parent or caregiver’s phone in the car and sends alerts to that phone and eventually other contacts if it detects the child has been left in the car. This innovative device is more than just an alert system; it’s a beacon of peace for parents on the go. Not only does it detect the presence of your child in the car, but it also ensures they’re never left behind.
With three alert levels and compatibility with nearly all car seats and boosters, SensAlert offers modern-day solutions to age-old worries. Dive with us into this marvel that’s turning cars into safer havens for our young ones.
Upon first glance the Doona SensAlert looks just like a simple piece of rectangular foam with a hole in the middle. It is lightweight and soft with a zipper opening along the outer edge allowing you to remove the cover for cleaning. The overall design is about as impressive as it can be for its intended purpose.
The SensAlert comes in a single color/design with a distinctive Doona theme that anyone who has a Doona product will recognize. It sports a yellow Doona label on its surface with black polyester fabric. The fabric features a signature Doona print that can be found on other products like the Doona Essentials Bag and Doona car seat/stroller. The pattern on the SensAlert reminds us of the pattern found on the front grille of the Mercedes-Benz EQS electric sedans and SUV’s. The pattern is nearly identical in fact!
We like that the simple design of the Doona SensAlert not only matches well with Doona products but it also goes well with any other brands car seat or booster seat design. After all, the design doesn’t need to stand out or make a statement since it will spend most of its time hidden under your child.
The SensAlert pad itself is lightweight and shouldn’t add any significant weight to a car seat. Weight was probably a huge factor when Doona developed and engineered the pad. The SensAlert pad itself only weighs just shy of 1/4 of a pound. depending on the size of your little one that weight could be approximate to a soiled diaper. You most likely won’t ever notice it when carrying it around.
The SensAlert pad is a bit of an amazing little piece of equipment when it comes to the technology. As we mentioned, it is designed to be as lightweight as possible. This includes everything from the thickness of fabrics and consistency of foam to even the weight of the embedded sensors themselves.
The Doona SensAlert pad contains internal capacitive sensors that are tuned to detect the weight and presence of even the youngest children. This sensitivity allows it to be rated for use with babies as small as newborns.
Of course, consideration for water resistance was taken since hardly anything can remain dry around small children. The sensors are protected from contact with fluids by the SensAlert pad’s neoprene outer layer. When accidents do happen, the sensors can be removed and the Doona SensAlert can be gently hand-washed.
These sensors in the SensAlert are able to connect to a users phone whether they are using Android or iOS operating systems. The operator must have the Doona app installed on their device and be running at least iOS 11 or Andriod 5.0 or newer. This means that even those with aging devices are still able to connect to and use the Doona SensAlert system.
The connection from the Doona SensAlert to the mobile device is made via a low frequency bluetooth connection. This is what then allows the SensAlert pad to determine the proximity of the person and the pad. When the distance between the pad and the connected user extends beyond that of a vehicle is, the software then begins its alert process.
Powered by 2x CR 2032 replaceable batteries, the Doona SensAlert pad’s got stamina. Expect about a year’s worth of battery life, based on an average use of an hour a day. The system is also designed to provide you with low battery warnings via email when the batteries begin to lose juice.
And don’t you worry, it’s built to weather temperatures from a chilly -20°C right up to a scorching 60°C. Doona has completed much of the same sort of extreme temperature testing that many of the other parts of your car’s interior have gone through to ensure SensAlert can withstand the harsh environment of a vehicle.
You simply turn the Doona SensAlert on and it connects automatically to your phone via the Doona app. Then you place the pad on the car seat bottom face up according to the included instructions. Once the pad is placed correctly the baby is ready to sit on it.
When the Doona SensAlert pad senses the child has been left in the car it begins the first warning alert. It sends a notification to the phone of the connected user with a message telling them the child has been left in the car.
If the user ignores that first warning notification then the system calls the user’s phone directly. If there is still no response then the alerts extend to the mandatory emergency contacts phones added in the Doona app.
We love the idea and execution of the Doona SensAlert product! It is something that we wish everyone had. Because the SensAlert can be set up to be used by up to three users, it can give extra peace of mind to parents who have other people (nannies, friends, caregivers, etc.) driving their child around.
Look, as parents, we’ve seen it all — the good, the bad, the downright unnecessary. But the Doona SensAlert? It’s a gem. Harnessing technology to address a genuine concern, it’s like having an extra set of eyes, ears, and, well, senses.
The Doona SensAlert is available on Amazon HERE