Tag Archive for: MyGait

New Tech, Old Problems At Silvers Summit 2012

Blog.AARP.org

Posted on 01/13/2012 by // AARP Blog Author

We know that baby boomers are a big group of people. We know that in a 3-month period over this last year, baby boomers spent an average of $367 online every month, more than double the amount of those ages 18 to 22 spend online. We know that the dollars spent on caregiving every year can easily beat the number of dollars spent on the average wedding. So, if there’s this market of moms and dads and grandparents and caregivers putting their hearts and wallets into these statistics, where’s the venture capitalists? Where are the tech blog journalists with their miniature cameras?

You might be surprised.

The Silvers Summit, held during the mother-of-all-tradeshows, the Consumer Electronics Show, has run for the past 8 years. In 2012, it doubled in size. It exhibited a wide variety of products, hosted 39 speakers talking about everything from gaming to customer service, and awarded an inaugural Sterling Award to five companies in five categories. It had a hashtag. Over just one day, 117,430 people on Twitter.com saw coverage of its exhibitors and quotes from its speakers.

You might have expected to see ClearSounds here – my father, at 59, is dependent on products like theirs after early hearing loss – but you might not have expected to see Sterling Award winner LiveMocha, a “language learning community.” I’ve always wanted to visit Istanbul; given the time, I could join LiveMocha and not only take language lessons, but connect with others doing the same thing. Maybe I’d end up meeting a great travel partner; maybe I’d just get to practice my new Turkish with someone across the country I’ll never meet.

Much like the Nintendo Wii’s crossover appeal to older adults, Sterling Award winner AutoVerbal – aimed at helping kids with autism communicate with the help of pictures – has an obvious appeal for anyone struggling with muscle memory and vision. For caregivers, Sterling Award winner GrandCare’s all-in-one-sytem is invaluable – it’ll remind you to take your pills, could alert your caregiver that your blood pressure is out of whack, or – simplest of all – makes it easy for you to send your granddaughter a Facebook message. Made-for-seniors computing system MyGait, a Sterling Award winner in the “Entertainment” category, simplifies all that clicking into an easy-to-use PC system – and for our money, the best part is the keyboard. (It’s the simple things.) Check it out – big keys, bright colors!

Sometimes, great products for the aging are just well-designed versions of things we’ve known all our lives. In the “cause-worthy”

http://blog.aarp.org/2012/01/13/new-tech-old-problems-at-silvers-summit-2012/

CES 2012, Day One: Stay Connected, Live Longer

Posted on 01/11/2012 by // AARP Blog Author

The Consumer Electronics Show, held every year in Vegas, promises the newest, best, and the flashiest gadgets. New sparkly TVs may not quite make your lunch, but they will let you order takeout online; for $129, a robot can read your Facebook feed to you. (What? I’ve always wanted my friends’ political speeches and baby updates enunciated in robot voice.)

Robots and 3D TVs aside, what you might’ve seen at the Silvers Summit took all that gadgetry and reduced it down to something very simple: stay connected with your friends and family, live longer.

 

It’s no Facebook robot, but GrandCare‘s all-in-one system could remind you to take your pills, might alert your caregiver that your blood pressure is out of whack, or – simplest of all – makes it easy for you to send your granddaughter a Facebook message.

Made-for-seniors computing system MyGait simplifies all that clicking into an easy-to-use PC system – and for our money, the best part is the keyboard. (It’s the simple things.) Check it out – big keys, bright colors!

LiveMocha makes it possible for you to learn a new language with your friends – or meet new ones while absorbing those complicated Mandarin letters. Shiny gadget? Nope, but what if you met a few new friends while learning Russian together? We’ll take that over any shiny gadget.

As an OnStar rep aptly put it yesterday, “It’s not about adapting our lives for tech, it’s about adapting tech for our lives.”

That’s Day One. Tomorrow, we’ll look at smart fridges that know when you’re out of milk, smart washing machines that buzz your smartphone when they’re done, and smart fingernail clippers. (Maybe not the last one, but this is CES – you never know.) Stay tuned – you can bookmark all our CES blogs right here.

GrandCare Nominated for the Silver’s Choice Award

Welcome to the Silvers Choice (people’s choice) in our first-ever Sterling Awards for the Silvers Summit at CES.

GrandCare has been selected as one of a few technologies to be nominated for the People’s Choice/Silver’s Choice Awards at CES, sponsored by AARP. We would love your vote!  Please take a moment and vote here: http://silverssummit.com/silvers-choice-awards/

Vote your Silver’s Choice Award

Education and Learning: Livemocha by LivemochaCause-Worthy Product: Unique Touch Grab Bars by Great GrabzEntertainment: My Gait Senior Computer by My GaitHealth and Wellness: GC Homebase by GrandCare SystemsRelationships and Family Caregiving: Auto Verbal by No Tie

The purpose of the inaugural Sterling Awards is to identify the peerless products (design, functionality, purpose) that enhance, empower and exemplify the lifestyles of the Boomer and Silvers audience.

All companies with a product or service that meets the following criteria may enter for a chance to be an award winner:

Product or service must solve a problem/issue and have relevancy for the lifestyles for those age 50+:

      • Limited mobility and agility
      • Limitations with eyesight or hearing
      • Cognitive thinking skills/brain health
      • Communication, education and engagement

Product must enhance one of the following for those age 50+:

      • Health and wellness aiding longevity
      • Intergenerational interaction and learning (includes family caregiving)
      • Safety (in the home, car, community, etc.)
      • Social connectivity or networks (help in eliminating isolation)
      • Engages user in social or environmental cause

Awards will be given in the following categories:

    • Entertainment
    • Health & Wellness
    • Relationships and Family Caregiving
    • Education and Continued Learning

The Sterling Awards are sponsored by AARP.

Gen X-ers Show the Way in Aging/Technology Services? Perhaps we are looking to the wrong generation to lead the way…

Just some thoughts I had the other day when I was reading Steve Gurney’s (from Retirement Living) “Swimming in a Sea of Gadgets” post on his impressions of the Silvers Summit at CES. One of the points he makes is that if we create easier computers for seniors to use (think GrandCare, MyGait, Telikin, etc), wouldn’t everyone want to use them?

This really struck a chord with me. Not only do I absolutely agree that this is key, but it also made me start to think that maybe we are, indeed, marketing to the wrong people. Arlene Harris from Jitterbug once spoke on our GrandCare weekly Aging & Technology Webinar and she made the point that nobody wants to feel “old”. When they designed the Jitterbug, they designed it for everybody – and it was, of course, a fantastic new tool for senior clients…but it didn’t make them feel old. When marketing, they targeted 20 years younger than the “Client”, because everybody sort of identifies with their “perception” of who they want to be and not necessarily who they are.

So, the idea with all of these new Non-Computer, but is a computer, solutions is that it is easier for anyone to have the complete computer experience (in a non traditional way). No mouse, no complicated URL bars, no garbled junk that you need to wade through…sounds familiar…oh yeah – sounds like my IPAD!! I think about how my iPhone and iPad have changed not only my life, but the lives of my 2 and 4 year old. It took them about 2 minutes to become absolutely fluent in the art of IPADDING 🙂

So let’s think about these products. They are not designed to be geriatric, but instead hip, cool and the “IT” thing to do. People are trying them out and saying, wow – my kids/parents could do this. Now, I am not sure that my 87 year old grandfather could navigate through my IPAD…probably not. But, I do know from first-hand experience that he has had ZERO trouble with the GrandCare Touch Interface…If we design it for anyone to use -it becomes less of a “this works well only if you’re old” mentality. Take my two kids…once again – I have a GrandCare TouchScreen mounted in our kitchen. It reminds us (loudly) to give the kids their Flinstone Gummy Vitamins at night. In fact, my husband grabbed the audio file from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” and Nurse Ratched says “Medication Time” if the med cabinet has not been opened by 7pm. We enjoy little things like that and the boys think it’s hilarious. We also use it to put our schedules on there – so everyone is aware of the calendar events (replacing the big calendar we had on the wall when I was a kid where we had to (Gasp) WRITE on it). The GrandCare System updates us with the weather, shows pictures (the boys love the animal stock photos). I also add pictures from birthday parties (we don’t really have tangible photo albums around the house for the kids to look at) so the kids LOVE seeing their friends and cousins on the “TV” in our kitchen. We think of it as a huge digital photo frame (on steroids) when it’s not being actively used. It’s fun and a fantastic entertainment piece while the boys sit at the table waiting for dinner. Another thing I (as a parent) really enjoy is that I can remotely program which YouTube and Streaming Videos/Music can be accessible through the touchscreen for my kids to access. I don’t know if you’ve seen some of the stuff on YouTube, but even seemingly appropriate “I love Waffles” songs can quickly turn into dirty sexual waffle songs…hard to believe, I know…but I do try to be very careful with what the boys are watching. The remote control that I have is wonderful and I can constantly add new songs and videos for the kids to enjoy! I also put notes on there for our babysitters (where we are, directions for bedtime, directions for my 2 year old’s nebulizer, etc) and our contact information is always there (at all times), should someone need to contact us. Our GrandCare System also does some basic home automation stuff (turns on the hallway light if anyone gets out of bed during the night to use the bathroom, calls my cell phone if someone opened the front door during the night – I’m looking at my 2 year old on this one, turns off lights after periods of inactivity, etc.)

It’s so easy to see why all ages could benefit from a system like this. Perhaps WE GEN X-ers are the ones that need to be the early adopters and show the way!!!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD0qdEZd1PM]
– Laura Mitchell
VP Marketing
GrandCare Systems

Remote Supports & Assistive Technology – GrandCare

EHX Home Health Tech Pavilion – GREAT SUCCESS!!

Just returned from 5 days in Sunny Orlando (at least they tell us it was sunny) – wouldn’t know, we spent the entire time at the Electronic House Expo at the Orange County Convention Center! And wow – what a great show for the home health technology industry!

Overall, the show attendance was down. We had heard this and wondered what the show would have in store for us! We really couldn’t have been busier, so it really said a LOT about the shift towards home health for the dealers in this industry.

We arrived on Tuesday morning and spent the entire day in the Peabody, revamping GrandCare dealer training for the next day.

Wednesday, we arrived at 8am for GrandCare Authorized dealer training! The room was abuzz as 30 NEW GrandCare dealers loaded in ready to SPEED train as we powered through about 15 hours of material in 7.5….

Great session, the session went great and the dealers were very interactive and seemed to gain a lot of information!!

ON Thursday at 10am, the EHX show floor opened. It appeared to be about less than half of what it was about 2 years ago. A sign of a bad economy, that’s clear. The silver lining is that the people that DO come are the decision makers AND the ones TRULY interested. We had many dealers that came up and said home health tech is the ONLY reason they attended EHX. A truly positive sign for this industry!

GrandCare was pounded ALL day Thursday by interested dealers – we had an extra large booth with 5 GC reps(represented by a few GC staff and Home Controls (Strategic Dist Partner) and Elder-Watch (Master dealer)).

The first panel session moderated by Laurie Orlov was a huge success. It was standing room only as the 4 panelists from GrandCare Systems, Celery, LogicMark and Halo Monitoring explained their products as Laurie Orlov moderated (recap here: http://www.ageinplacetech.com/blog/aarp-and-those-boomers-recareerers-and-home-related-professionals)

Later Thursday afternoon, GrandCare hosted the weekly agetech call LIVE FROM THE EHX FLOOR!!! Using a mic and webcam, GrandCare’s Laura Mitchell (host of the agetech call and VP Chair of the AgeTek Alliance board) hosted the weekly call from the GrandCare booth and interviewed other aging and technology vendors as well as some of the interested dealers.
Recording (including video) http://my.dimdim.com/view2/all/grandcare/default/138cae63-c640-42c4-9748-2888bdf11e5e

End of Day One – GREAT SUCCESS & Many Many Leads to show from it. 17 of us from the Aging and technology pavilion went out to celebrate with dinner and drinks at a local watering hole!!

Friday – Day Two…to be continued…