Tag: Apps

The 9 Best Apps and Tech Tips to Help Older Loved Ones Stay Healthy

From memory lapses to poor physical fitness, aging comes with a slew of health challenges. These challenges can impede the ability of elderly loved ones to function on their own in a healthy manner.

Apart from medical care from qualified professionals, there are several technology tips you can apply to ensure that older loved ones continue to live healthy and happy lives. Here are some good apps, devices, and resources to help your elderly loved ones stay healthy and safe.

1. Recommend Brain-Stimulating Apps

Some of the most common challenges of aging include deteriorating memory and other mental faculties. When someone’s memory begins to decline, their mind isn’t as sharp as it needs to be to go through normal day-to-day activities. You can help older loved ones stay sharp and retain much of their focus using memory and focus training apps.

Two great options are Lumosity and CogniFit Test and Brain Games. Both apps are feature-packed and filled with games of different complexities aimed at keeping players active and sharp. The features are particularly great for elders and are tailored to each individual’s profile with an option to track progress. Feel free to pick more apps from this larger list of brain-training apps to develop a sharper mind.

Download: Lumosity for Android | iOS (Free, subscription available)

Download: CogniFit Test and Brain Games for Android | iOS (Free, subscription available)

2. Get Elders a Medication Reminder App

Whether your loved one takes medication for an ailment or supplements to keep them in top shape, the forgetfulness that often accompanies old age may affect their ability to take their medications on time.

The solution is a medication reminder app. The aptly named Pill Reminder app and MediSafe are two popular options for iOS devices. Meanwhile, Dosecast, My Therapy Pill Reminder, and Alarm and Pill Reminder are popular options for Android.

3. Embrace Online Health Resources

There is a wealth of useful online resources that can augment the health information that seniors get from their healthcare providers. While the information you get online should not be treated as qualified medical advice, it still represents an incredibly useful resource to stay informed of important health tips.

Trusted websites for sourcing reliable medical information include the following:

If you’d prefer to have direct interaction with medical personnel, here are some of the best health forums for online expert support. These resources can help seniors understand why they feel the way they do, and you’ll also have an informed insight into what’s going on in their lives.

4. Set Up Online Grocery and Meal Delivery

Seniors may not be able to safely traverse several physical stores for groceries on their own. Even when they choose to shop online, it can be a bit tedious for them. Setting up an online grocery delivery service ensures that your loved ones have access to healthy food and can get their groceries when they’re needed.

Although the availability of online grocery delivery services differs from place to place, big players like the following are good options with wide coverage, especially within North American cities:

5. Use Location Sharing and Smart Trackers to Keep Track of Loved Ones and Their Things

If you have elderly relatives that are at risk of getting lost or prone to wandering off, ask them to share the location of their smartphone or a GPS-enabled fitness tracker, such as an Apple Watch. The Find My app on iOS and other similar friend-finding apps can give you peace of mind as you’ll be able to see where your loved one is in real time.

Meanwhile, if they have a tendency to misplace their purse, wallet, or other important items, gift them an Apple AirTag or similar Bluetooth tracker. With just a $30 AirTag, you can leverage Apple’s impressive Find My network to track down a tagged item almost anywhere in the world. AirTags are small enough that they can put one in a bag, wallet, keychain, or any object your elderly relative carries around often.

6. Introduce Elderly Loved Ones to Virtual Reality

VR is an underused technology in the field of elder care. Its immersive nature means you can help your elderly loved ones “virtually” participate in activities in which they might not otherwise be able to safely take part. Think of those fishing, driving, or high-intensity activities they might be yearning for but unable to do in the real world.

Virtual Reality can bridge the gap and help older loved ones feel happy and fulfilled. The best part is that these activities will be nearly as stimulating as the real thing. It’s a great way to help someone take part in exercises, meditation, and other fun-filled activities.

Social media might have a bad reputation, but it’s still an important tool to help people connect with friends and family. Maintaining close relationships can help older loved ones fend off loneliness and depression that are all too common among seniors. Facebook is still a great place to start, and some loved ones might also become interested in creativity-focused sites like Pinterest.

Avoid social media sites that have a disproportionate amount of toxicity, are too argumentative, or might expose seniors to any form of traumatic media. These could be counterproductive and could have a serious effect on their health.

8. Install Fitness Apps to Help Seniors Exercise Safely

Staying physically active is critical to seniors’ overall health. You might not always be there to guide them through suitable exercises, but technology could be of great help. However, not all types of exercises are suitable for seniors. Most seniors are better off doing low-intensity exercises with easy-to-perform routines.

Senior Fitness and Sitting Cardio apps are two good senior-friendly fitness apps for Android. Similarly, the Over Fifty Fitness app is a great option for iOS users. Feel free to check out this list of the best fitness apps for seniors to find what will work best for your loved ones.

9. Encourage the Use of Wearable Fitness Devices

Wearable devices like Apple Watch and Google’s Fitbit aren’t just trendy technology for young people. They can be very pivotal in helping seniors live healthier, happier lives.

With features like a heart rate sensor, fall detection, blood oxygen level detection, temperature sensor, and a slew of workout apps, the Apple Watch Series 8 is an incredibly useful example of a tool for helping seniors stay on top of their health information. An Apple Watch can help elders prioritize their sleep and get timely alerts on their health status, which you can also access or share with care providers when necessary.

Help Seniors Get the Care They Deserve

Old age shouldn’t be littered with limitations, especially when technology has availed us of the tools to make the best out of this phase of life. While your older loved ones might need more support than they used to, helping them effectively utilize health-related technology can help them enjoy a full and healthy life with a bit more independence, along with more peace of mind for you.

December 17, 2022
Are Health Care Apps in Your Future? | Health News

(HealthDay)

FRIDAY, March 4, 2022 (HealthDay Information) — Are you running a serious wellness issue, be it weight problems or diabetes or coronary heart disease or bronchial asthma?

You will find probably an app for that.

Health apps are getting much more and far more complex, presenting smartphone consumers enable in dealing with long-term ailments, mentioned Dr. David Bates, chief of inner medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, and an internationally renowned pro in patient basic safety and health care know-how.

“It may differ fairly a ton by application, but some of the apps have been shown to final result in benefits,” Bates stated in the course of a HealthDay Now interview. “Some of the excess weight loss apps actually do assist individuals reduce bodyweight. Similarly, some of the diabetic issues apps can enable you manage your [blood] sugar far more effectively.”

Sad to say, it can be challenging to determine out which application is most effective, supplied the baffling assortment accessible to the regular person.

“There are truly numerous hundred thousand on the marketplace, which is just bewildering as a patient,” Bates stated. That indicates many folks with persistent health problems are not taking benefit of these new tools, according to a current HealthDay/Harris Poll survey.

About 61{fe463f59fb70c5c01486843be1d66c13e664ed3ae921464fa884afebcc0ffe6c} of people residing with a chronic issue explained they use some sort of wellness application, but only 14{fe463f59fb70c5c01486843be1d66c13e664ed3ae921464fa884afebcc0ffe6c} claimed they are making use of an application exclusively geared in direction of handling or tracking their precise wellbeing problem, the study identified.

A single-third of people with a persistent sickness stated they really don’t bother with an app for the reason that they will not come to feel the want to consistently monitor their well being, the poll outcomes showed. And a quarter of individuals with serious problems stated they are worried about the privacy and safety of professional medical details they share with the application. About 17{fe463f59fb70c5c01486843be1d66c13e664ed3ae921464fa884afebcc0ffe6c} stated they just are unable to pay for well being apps, and 14{fe463f59fb70c5c01486843be1d66c13e664ed3ae921464fa884afebcc0ffe6c} claimed they locate them also sophisticated.

Bates’ very own investigate into wellbeing app use uncovered similar developments.

“There is moderately prevalent use among the a wide variety of age groups, but they’re notably well known among the persons who are younger and tech savvy,” Bates instructed HealthDay Now. Here’s the whole job interview underneath:

Bates pointed to one the latest research amid people today with either language barriers or very little schooling. It located that “most people required to be ready to use the apps, but quite a few people today struggled with accomplishing even very simple jobs, like as a diabetic coming into your blood sugar [numbers],” he mentioned.

“The privateness issues are a real problem, and the applications are not executing as good a position as they might in conditions of preserving our privateness,” Bates mentioned. “Which is a little something we have to have to continue to target on. Substantially of this variety of knowledge is not that private, but some of it is.”

Folks in the marketplace for a wellness application ought to know that on-line ratings in the app retailers “are not always a seriously very good predictor of how fantastic the app is likely to be for you,” Bates said.

Bates and his colleagues have suggested that an independent 3rd bash start out score wellness apps, so people today will be ready to uncover top quality items that go well with their wants.

“We have to have to do a little something to restrict the quantity of decision, for the reason that when you have that quite a few choices folks frequently just won’t be able to choose. It really is also hard,” Bates claimed.

Limiting the quantity to some degree would be really useful, he proposed. “For illustration, in England they have about 60 applications that are endorsed nationally and promoted. There is certainly a good deal of competitors to get into that team, but that helps make it a lot less complicated to choose which types may well be pertinent for you,” he discussed.

With the advent of telemedicine, apps are getting to be even additional crucial, Bates included.

People usually have to get their possess essential indications and observe their personal wellbeing details, so they can report their conclusions to their health practitioner throughout a telemedicine visit.

“Ordinarily, you will find a lot more responsibility positioned on the individual to deal with things them selves, and an app can help you a whole lot,” Bates claimed. “It can aid you observe some of the numerous matters you should be viewing,” like your daily blood sugar levels or your weekly work out periods.

Sooner or later, Bates believes that wellbeing gurus will start off “essentially prescribing applications. You’ll go to your health care provider and they’ll suggest that you use an app. Points will be established up so that the facts can appear back again to them, and they can see how you’re accomplishing. If you are doing effectively, they will congratulate you, and if you’re struggling a little bit they can support you out.”

But for now, he warns that there are drawbacks to some applications out there. In individual, Bates is concerned that applications are not terrific at notifying people today of life-threatening conditions.

“For several applications you can say your blood sugar is 10, which is existence-threateningly lower, and the application will not essentially tell you that you need to have to do anything urgently,” he mentioned. “I might like to see the apps do a better task all-around warning you if there is a major situation.”

Supply: David Bates, MD, chief, inside medication, Brigham and Women’s Clinic, Boston

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

March 6, 2022
7 Best Weight Loss Apps of 2021, According to a Dietitian

Even though we are (luckily) going previous the era of toxic food plan society and emotion like you will need to limit what you consume, there are certain situations you might want enable monitoring your meals consumption.

Perhaps you’re searching for accountability to get back on observe just after a yr of psychological feeding on or to come to feel extra energized during the working day. Most likely you might be hunting to assist your work out aims or have even received doctor’s orders to start out having much healthier.

Irrespective,

fat decline

applications can help you go about meals tracking in a healthful and sustainable way.

“There are a lot of free of charge and paid out applications to assistance you find out how to try to eat additional healthfully,” Samantha Cassetty, RD, national diet and wellness qualified with a non-public observe primarily based in New York City, instructed Insider. “The most crucial detail is to find a single that supports a variety of healthful foodstuff in balanced amounts that are suitable for your needs.”

Under are seven of the greatest excess weight loss apps that are intended precisely for a wide range of existence. At the close of this guidebook, I have also included solutions to a few FAQs, such as insight into how excess weight decline applications can assistance, as well added suggestions from Samantha Cassetty on why creating balanced improvements will take a lot more than just the support of an app.

In this article are the ideal excess weight loss applications:

Most effective overall: Noom, from $17
Noom distinguishes by itself from other diet and excess weight decline applications by looking at your total life style somewhat than just food stuff intake.

Ideal on a finances: Excess weight Watchers, from $21.95/month on iOS and Android
Bodyweight Watchers has helped persons reduce body weight for decades and does a good task of creating the changeover to the electronic age.

Most effective free of charge application: MyNetDiary, cost-free with quality offered on iOS and Android
If you happen to be relaxed running your individual foodstuff choices, MyNetDiary is an great solution for totally free.

Very best for physical fitness: MyFitnessPal, cost-free or update for $79.99/yr on iOS and Android
MyFitnessPal encourages end users to think about the points they eat, while also aiding them come to be far more energetic at the exact same time.

Finest meals tracking app: Drop It!, no cost or top quality for $40/yr on iOS and Android
Eliminate It! allows you quickly and conveniently input the foods you’ve eaten to compute your caloric ingestion for the working day — and the app is intuitive enough for anybody to use.

Finest for chaotic existence: Increase, $48/month on iOS
Rise is the meals tracker that isn’t going to need an intensive total of time to use — even minimum enter can offer people with huge gain.

Most effective for at-household cooks: Fooducate, totally free or $4/mo for top quality capabilities on iOS and Android
Fooducate is the informational device you will need if you might be searching to enhance your nourishment but will not know exactly where to get started.

December 15, 2021