Australia’s population is aging fast. And with aging come barriers to living an independent and active life. Older adults face limited mobility and dexterity, difficulty with memory, and degenerating cognitive faculties as they age. Technology is seen as a big disruptor that will provide seniors tools to overcome these challenges. But most seniors, technologically challenged as they are, are happy to rely only on those technology solutions that integrate seamlessly into their lives, support their habits and routines rather than changing them altogether.
Check out these latest hi-tech devices that do not require hi-tech skills, yet are making the lives of the Australian seniors easier, safer, and more independent.
1. Smart Sensors That Learn Your Routines
Tiny and low powered, sensors are devices installed in your home that work in the background, unobtrusively, monitoring your movements, and learning your daily activities. Sensors capture your patterns of daily living and notify your long-distance caregivers of any anomalies such as lack of activity, forgetting to take medication or a fall.
2. Smartphones and Tablets
There is no denying that though smartphones ensure ease and accessibility to the older generation, they were never marketed keeping the seniors in mind. But that is changing now. Many phone manufacturers are coming up with seniors’ mobile phone that are tailor-made for the elderly.
Keeping in view their special needs, these easy-to-use and easy-to-read phones come with bigger buttons and purpose-built screen. The built-in assistive technology, designed for seniors, like hearing -aid or emergency buttons helps them overcome age-related challenges. Internet connectivity and social media apps on smartphones not only let the elderly create social connections but also help keep track of health schedules and deliver reminders.
3. Tracking Devices For Active Lifestyles
These wearable devices measure heart rate, track steps taken, count calories burned, and even monitor sleep quality. That data is then converted into charts that a senior can view on their tablet or smartphone. Seniors can easily use these devices to set and track goals for healthy living.
4. Medication Dispensers and Reminders
Aging adults often suffer from poor memory. This can prove fatal when they forget to take their daily dose of medication. Modern innovative technology has solved this problem. Medication dispensing systems, linked to smartphones, work in a way that reminds the seniors when it is time to take their pills and also administer the correct dosages, information for which have already been fed into the machine by a caregiver.
5. Emergency Response Systems
While personal emergency response systems have been there for a while now, new technology has made them more accurate and connected. The latest all-in-one emergency voice call-out and fall-detection device not only monitor for falls in subtler ways but also tracks vital signs like heart and respiratory rate and oxygen saturation, other physical activity, and sleep quality. It also provides medication reminders.
As people live longer, fresh challenges get introduced to their everyday life. What gives hope is that technology is finding newer ways to eliminate these challenges that crowd the world of the seniors.