Success Story
Mentech gives a voice to people who struggle to express their emotions through connected care technology
Dutch healthcare technology company Mentech uses reliable IoT connectivity from Wireless Logic to power its HUME smart sock, helping caregivers detect rising stress in real time and intervene before situations escalate.
Mentech is a Dutch healthcare technology company developing solutions that help caregivers recognise emotional distress in people who struggle to communicate how they feel, including those with intellectual disabilities, dementia and complex mental health conditions.
Founded in 2016 by Dutch entrepreneur and engineer Tom Bos, Mentech was inspired by his experience supporting a young boy who struggled to express his emotions. This sparked an idea: could technology help caregivers recognise distress before it escalates?
The result was HUME, a smart sock that detects rising tension in real time, helping caregivers intervene earlier and prevent escalations.
Today, Mentech employs around 35 people, with its technology used by more than 50 care organisations. The company has also developed NOA, an AI-powered assistant designed to support caregivers and give people receiving care greater autonomy.
The challenge
From the start, Mentech set out to detect rising tension in real time among people who struggle to communicate their emotions. Without early warning signs, caregivers often only intervene once situations have escalated, potentially leading to physical restraints, staff absence and emotional distress for both patients and caregivers.
Mentech’s smart sock measures physiological indicators of stress, including skin conductance, similar to clammy hands under stress, heart rate and movement. Using machine learning models trained on data from hundreds of participants, the system can predict rising tension in real time. The collected data is transmitted to a cloud platform, where caregivers can analyse patterns and evaluate interventions.
However, reliable IoT connectivity was essential. Sensors continuously transmit data via Bluetooth to a connected hub, which forwards it to the cloud. Initially, Mentech relied on conventional mobile subscriptions, but these could no longer meet its growing connectivity needs. Increasing data volumes, the need for stable connections and the complexity of managing multiple devices called for a more scalable IoT solution.
Ease of use was another critical consideration. Many people receiving care find conventional wearables uncomfortable or difficult to tolerate. Mentech therefore continues to develop smaller, less intrusive solutions, including sensors fully integrated into the sock and more durable textile electrodes.
Today, HUME continuously processes large volumes of data across dozens of care organisations, delivering real-time alerts and insights to caregivers and behavioural specialists.
The solution
To ensure reliable, continuous data transmission, Mentech partnered with Wireless Logic. Data must reach care teams consistently and on time, enabling them to respond before situations become more difficult to manage.
Wireless Logic provides scalable IoT connectivity that enables Mentech to manage data plans centrally, maintain consistent data transmission and support more care organisations as its deployment grows.
By moving from conventional consumer mobile subscriptions to professional machine-to-machine (M2M) connectivity, Mentech gained more control over bandwidth and network coverage.
Today, HUME smart socks communicate through connected hubs that transmit data to Mentech’s cloud environment, hosted on AWS infrastructure in Frankfurt. Real-time data is processed through dashboards and mobile applications, giving caregivers immediate insight into rising tension.
The system uses traffic-light signals (green, amber and red) so care teams can recognise when someone may need additional support and respond in time.
Beyond real-time alerts, the connected infrastructure enables care teams to analyse longer-term patterns and evaluate interventions. Does going for a walk help reduce tension? Does physical reassurance make a difference? Could adjusting someone’s daily routine improve their wellbeing?
These insights help care organisations make more objective, evidence-based decisions. Where interpretations of behaviour previously varied between staff members, HUME provides measurable data for care plans, interventions and evaluations.
The outcome
By making signs of distress measurable, HUME helps caregivers better understand behaviour and intervene earlier. Across several care organisations, Mentech reports fewer escalations, reduced use of physical restraints and lower levels of staff absence.
In one care organisation, HUME revealed that a woman experiencing severe challenging behaviour benefited from physical closeness and reassurance rather than being given more space. By adapting their approach, caregivers almost completely eliminated her daily escalations.
Staff spent less time managing incidents, experienced less pressure and gained more time for the people in their care. In this individual case, the organisation achieved approximately €30,000 in savings.
Mentech continues to develop less intrusive stress-detection technologies, including contactless solutions that use breathing patterns and radar. The company is also improving the sustainability of its smart socks and expanding NOA, its AI-powered care assistant.
International growth is another priority, with research projects and partnerships already underway in Belgium, Norway and Austria. Although healthcare funding models differ between countries, Mentech sees opportunities to bring its connected care technology to more organisations.
With the Conexa mobile core network and eSIM capabilities, Mentech can expand into new markets without having to negotiate separate connectivity contracts with mobile network operators in each country.