4 Great Devices to Help Seniors Monitor Health

Monitoring senior health in all its facets is useful. Getting to an older person quickly after they’ve taken a nasty fall down the stairs or scalded their hand when cooking is very important. Similarly, being able to check on their level of physical activity helps to encourage them to stay more active.

Here are four great devices that can help seniors and their ongoing health.

1. Active Protective Personal Airbag for Hip Defense

One of the significant problems when getting older is taking a fall and breaking a hip. Sadly, many operations to fix a broken hip aren’t successful or the patient doesn’t survive a year past the surgery, which is especially invasive on an aging body.

To deal with these problems and try to avoid falls that damage the hip when landing awkwardly, Active Protection developed their Airbag Smart Belt product. It’s extremely clever and ideal for the senior market, especially for people who are now a little unsteady on their feet.

The Smart Belt fits around the waist. It is 2.5-inches wide and acts as a normal belt. It comes supplied with 3D sensors to detect sudden movement. Using this system, the belt can sense when a senior person is falling and within 60 milliseconds, its airbag system inflates. This provides a buffer around the waist and hip area, much like a car airbag system does, with the aim of preventing broken bones. (1)

2. Bay Alarm Medical Alert System

Another way to handle being unable to stand back up following a fall, an inability to climb out of the bath or having another problem that needs human intervention, is to wear a medical alert system.

These devices usually connect up to an active Wi-Fi network and use online communications to reach a medical call center. For this type of product, one of the top-rated brands in the Bay Alarm Medical one, which supports pushing a button on a wrist band or a pendant to reach their call center staff. At that point, the senior can get in touch with a friend, family member, or neighbor and contact the emergency services to send them on their way to assist them. (2)

3. Fitbit Charge 3

The Fitbit Charge is now in its 3^rd iteration. There are all sorts of health trackers on the market. Some offer full monitoring of health vital signs (or their best approximation of them) but often they’re more than seniors require.

The latest Charge 3 has switched from a wrist band with plastic and stainless steel to an aluminum one that should stand up to scrutiny. The tracker provides useful feedback on the heart rate, local oxygen levels, and other sensor-related data.

There are gentle workout options for seniors to keep more active. The curved screen lets the older user swipe around to check notifications from their smartphone right from their Fitbit. Their health-related information and activity are also tracked via the Dashboard.

While the device doesn’t use GPS to calculate waypoints and exact distances covered, it focuses more on footsteps tracked. As a result, the battery lasts considerably longer between charges compared to other similar offerings.

Remo Health

Remo Health is an interesting option that improves the monitoring of a loved one who’s home alone.

Their system provides a dashboard and access across the PC desktop and smartphone devices. There’s a mobile concierge feature, GPS tracking to locate your loved one should they get lost on a walk, useful alerts without overloading you, and remote monitoring too.

No external software is required to use the Remo Health system. The wearable watch auto-updates to keep things simple. This device is useful more as a total health solution expressly designed for seniors rather than offering just one or two features.

Maybe you have other suggestions for devices that seniors will find value in? Please let us know if you have other ideas.