Consider the following possible though unlikely 2017 tech advances. On the cusp of the new year and the 2017 CES announcement extravaganza, let’s hope. And beyond CES, here are a few semi-optimistic (or glass half-full) wishes for our technology lives – and the corollary of technology media coverage. Let's consider dropping the click bait media fawning over ever little twitch of self-driving cars.* Let's ask car manufacturers to consider simpler user interfaces (like this reviewed VW) for easier-to-manipulate temperature, audio and driving controls. And what else should we hope for?
Safety matters -- both to older adults and their loved ones. For those who worry about the elderly, home safety monitoring technology and personal emergency response offerings provide a degree of reassurance -- following the entry of MobileHelp as one of the first, most of the viable Personal Emergency Response System (PERS) vendors in the market today have a mobile device, enabling the older adult to leave the home, walk the dog, and wear a device while on trips. In addition, automatically-generated check-in technology can provide another degree of comfort for caregiving families and professional providers. During 2016, a number of new variants of safety-related introductions were made, including, but not limited to the following launches:
Tech announcements spew forth, fast and furiously – but most do not help older adults. Stay tuned and hopeful if you can, to the hundreds of announcements that will pour forth in the coming weeks from CES 2017 – hopefully a number of them focused on or at least interested in the care and/or services related to an aging population – and yes, according to the CDC, if one lives to age 65, life expectancy is unchanged. In the meantime, let’s reflect on 2016, which saw the rise in awareness of future caregiver shortages, shortages in family time, but not shortages in investor money:
We buy many insurances – just in case. Car, homeowners, apartment, flood, personal liability – all are hedges against the unknown and unwanted. Seeing a business opportunity, insurers created a long-term care insurance market for a benefit the customer might not need for another 25 years. We can buy a service contract to cover repairs of our appliances. Yet so it continues that when we purchase technology, carrier, or software services, the offering changes ever more quickly -- and our technology becomes obsolete. So we toss the products (and services) into the soon-forgotten gadget graveyard with 135 million mobile phones discarded in 2010 alone -- the last date for which there are EPA statistics.
From the universities and their affiliates – research about older adults. Since this website was launched in 2008, periodic looks at who is doing what in the area of research on aging have repeatedly revealed little in the way of commercialization determination or practicality of offerings. But funding is found – and several of these programs seem driven to reward innovation that can be commercialized – or they are funded by organizations that want and need results. Here are four from a recent scan -- there are more, of course, and if you know one that is more robust, please send it along or provide a comment:
Consider the following possible though unlikely 2017 tech advances. On the cusp of the new year and the 2017