By Gabi Redford MARCH 12,
2018
Nancy
Delano, 80, of Denver has no plans to slow down anytime soon. She still drives
to movies, plays and dinners out with friends. A retired elder care nurse who
lives alone, she also knows that “when you reach a certain age, emergencies can
happen fast.” So, when her son, Tom Rogers, talked to her about installing a
remote monitoring system, she didn’t hesitate.
With
motion sensors placed throughout the house, Rogers can see if his mom is moving
around, if she’s sleeping (or not), if she forgot to lock the door and, based
on a sophisticated algorithm that detects behavioral patterns, whether her
activity level or eating habits have changed significantly, for instance.
“It
gives both of us peace of mind, particularly as she ages and wants to live at
home,” said Rogers, who lives near Washington, D.C., hundreds of miles away
from her.
At
$45-$60 a month (plus an upfront fee of $100 to $200), Alarm.com’s Wellness
system is markedly less expensive than options such as hiring a home health
aide to check on her or moving her into a retirement community. The average
cost of nursing home care exceeds $95,000 a year, while assisted living and
in-home care tops $45,000 annually, according to a 2017 Genworth Financial report.
The
exorbitant costs of nursing home and assisted living care are driving sales —
and innovation — in the technology market, said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the
Scripps Translational Science Institute and author of “The Creative Destruction
of Medicine: How the Digital Revolution Will Create Better Health Care.”
For
many, the technology offers not just the tools they need to continue to live at
home, but newfound confidence and connectedness with faraway family and
friends.
Topol
calls it “monitored independence,” and it is changing how older generations age
in America. “People want to be autonomous, irrespective of age,” he said.
That
was certainly the case for Carol Smith, 83, who lives in the Carlsbad by the
Sea retirement community in Carlsbad, Calif., with her husband, Ray, 84. “I’m
in a wheelchair, so I depend on my husband a lot,” she said.
The
Smiths were introduced to the Amazon Echo last February through a pilot
program for seniors. Carol is now able to control lights and
the thermostat. She can ask Alexa to remind her to take medications, or to call
her brother or even to call for help.
“It
gives her a great deal of independence,” Ray said. “If for some reason I have
to be away, she’s able to function on her own. It’s keeping her safe, but
closely related to that, it’s allowing her to be independently safe.”
Voice-assistive
technologies like the Amazon Echo, Google Home and HomePod are likely to play a
bigger role in helping seniors age in place, especially when paired with apps
geared specifically for senior living, predicts Majd Alwan, executive director
of the LeadingAge Center for Aging Services Technologies (CAST). AskMarvee, for
instance, integrates with Amazon Echo via an online portal to allow seniors to
immediately connect with family members for a quick check-in or if something
more serious is going on. (The Basic app is free; premium versions cost $15 or
$20 per month.)
LifePod,
to be introduced later this year, takes voice-assisted technology a step
further, said Laurie Orlov, founder of Aging in Place Technology Watch. It will
allow users to engage with the device, much like Alexa, but will also
periodically check in with them independent of a voice prompt, at preprogrammed
intervals: Good morning, Nancy. Did you remember to take your
medication?
For
Mike Willis, 63, of Guelph, Ontario, getting regular medication prompts means
the difference between staying healthy and ending up in the hospital — again.
Willis takes 27 pills a day, most of them anti-rejection drugs to ensure that
his body doesn’t reject the heart transplant he received 2½ years ago after
contracting viral myocarditis. To keep it all straight, he uses Medisafe, an
app that reminds him when it’s time to take his next dose, whether to take the
pills with water or food, and what side effects might be attributable to the
medication.
“After
my transplant, I was a little confused, so I designated my wife, Linda, as a
‘MedFriend,’ which meant she got an alert when I didn’t take my medication,” he
said. (The app is free; the Premium version, with additional reminder and
Medfriend features, costs $4.99 a month.)
Indeed,
the ability to designate a loved one as a second set of eyes and ears can be
comforting rather than intrusive, as Willis and Delano have discovered. And
yet, there’s a fine line between technology that allows older adults to live
independently, and technology that reinforces stereotypical images of aging as
a slow decline toward death.
Until
recently, Personal Emergency Response Systems (PERS) — made famous by the
“Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” TV ads — was the only reliable
technology to help older adults who had fallen, says David Lindeman, director
of the Center for Technology and Aging at the University of
California-Berkeley.
By the
end of this month, MedHab, a Texas company best known for its wearable insoles
for rehab patients, will begin shipping MyNotifi, a medical alert wristband
designed to detect falls and send an alert to a family member or friend. “It
looks like a watch, and Mom or Dad can invite anybody they want, family or
friends, to get those alerts through the MyNotifi Fall Detection app,” said
MedHab President and CEO Johnny Ross. (The device is available for preorder at
$299.)
Similar
fall detection technologies in various stages of testing include SafelyYou,
which uses wall-mounted cameras and software algorithms to detect falls, and
UnaliWear’s Kanega watch, which combines fall detection, voice-assisted
emergency aid and medication reminders.
“If the
goal is independent and connected living, we need solutions that are
multifaceted and that connect people with their family, their doctors, their
neighbors,” said Jody Holtzman, senior managing partner of Longevity Venture
Advisors. “If the technology is framed in the context of fun and convenience,
like Alexa, then people will start to buy these things.”
Carol
Smith can’t imagine life without Alexa. When I read, “I just say, ‘Alexa, what
does this word mean?’ Or I ask Alexa to play the song. Oh, and I’m a basketball
fan, but if I can’t stay up late to watch the end of the game, I’ll ask Alexa
what the score is the next morning. There are so many things you can ask her.
She’s fun. And she’s always pleasant.”
KHN’s coverage of these topics is supported by John A. Hartford Foundation andThe SCAN Foundation
Gabi Redford: @gredford
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