Do We Need More Gadgets in Our Life? (A Report from the Biggest Electronics Show in the World)

I’ve heard more than one person complain about how many remotes it takes to watch TV, not to mention the problems that arise when someone, usually their kids, decides they need a new computer or a new phone, just when they had finally figured out how to operate the ones they had. Their well-meaning kids tell them about all the new capabilities the new gadget has, as if that was reason enough to get it, whether you really need all those new features or not. It’s a crazy, quickly changing world and some of us might feel like jumping off the merry-go-round and just let well enough be good enough. I agree, but there is one reason that I believe it’s worth allowing more gadgets into our lives – aging in place.

In my almost 25 years of talking with seniors the one thing I’ve heard over and over is their desire to age in place. Almost without exception, seniors don’t want to be forced to leave their homes and go to some type of assisted living situation. That happens because, as the name implies, they need assistance with their everyday living. Whether it’s moving around safely, taking medicine, requiring frequent tests, transportation, or not having someone close who can check on them. If there are “gadgets” that can efficiently perform some of these duties, we have the chance to extend the time we can remain in our homes or a place we choose. . .to age in place. That’s the reason I attended the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), to see what new innovations are coming available that will allow us to age in place.

Every year, early in January, the electronics manufacturers from all over the world descend on Las Vegas to showcase what the future of electronics looks like. It’s called CES and it has been attracting electronic innovators for decades. Over 115,000 people attended the conference this year and I thought it was an ideal chance to see which of these innovations would help older Americans age in place. I won’t mention the manufacturers’ names, because I don’t want to promote one innovation over another. What I will try to do is explain how a particular item will help us age in place.

There were some standalone health innovations that seemed very interesting in their own right. The one thing that seemed to gather an enormous amount of attention was a urine testing toilet. This gadget fits into your toilet and will collect a urine sample as you urinate and tell you things like, whether you are getting enough protein, are hydrated, or getting enough vitamin D. There’s more than one of these testing toilets and some had even more advanced features. One doctor speculated that as the testing matured it could even give an early warning of possible cancer. This type of ongoing testing might certainly reduce doctor visits.

Another very interesting device was an automatic pill dispenser. The pill bottle was inverted and fastened on top of the dispenser. The dispenser was programmed to dispense the appropriate dose at the appropriate interval and, through a fingerprint identification process, only to the correct person. It would link to the internet so it could send reminders and alerts if the patient hadn’t dispensed the medicine at the prescribed intervals. Taking medicine appropriately is one of the biggest reasons that patients require assistance. This device certainly helps from that point of view.

A boon to staying at home is the development of a remote patient monitoring system. One system made it possible to monitor a patient’s weight and blood pressure remotely through a simple blood pressure device and a connected scale. The patient would step on the scale and use the blood pressure monitor which would immediately send the information to the doctor and, if desired, the care giver. It provides peace of mind and allows instant notice and intervention if required. It also supplies a baseline of information that can be helpful with future diagnosis.

Another remote device was what I called a remote stethoscope and EKG. The device was the size and shape of a large cucumber and when held close to the chest you could hear the heartbeat with surprising clarity and then see an EKG output in real time on a remote screen. It seemed to me like this amazing device could give real time actionable data to a remote doctor.

One of the biggest areas of remote monitoring at CES was the smart home. The smart home to me was a way that you could turn lights off and on remotely (a little more advanced than clap on clap off) or see who was at the front door or control the heat and AC. For those who might be away for extended periods of time you could get monitors that emailed or texted you if you had water in the basement because a pipe burst or install sensors in the freezer in the garage to tell you if the freezer temperature gets too high. There are motion detectors and listening devices that detect people in the house and can even identify if they are friend or foe. You have a programmable robot vacuum that cleans your floor. All of these started out as stand-alone devices, but tech firms are finding ways to link them together so they can share information.

For instance, your robot vacuum senses a large form on the floor where the vacuum’s routing information says there shouldn’t be anything. While its job is to clean and go around obstacles, it can be programmed to send data to a central hub that gets alerted and then checks to see if medicine has been taken, if there hasn’t been movement detected for a while, it can then activate video cameras that can focus on the correct area and send pictures to care givers and/or emergency response personnel. This type of coordination is made possible by linking these different devices through a central hub. One way this is accomplished is through software called Matter. Matter is an open-source interoperability standard that allows smart home devices from any manufacturer to talk to other. It is the key to making your house a smart home.

There were updated and advanced self-driving cars at the show. While this great addition to allowing us to age in place is taking longer than expected to come to fruition, it is clearly something that will happen in the future.

As I talked with different people at the show, I continued to inquire how they were going to make these gadgets simple to operate. I often used the phrase, “we don’t need one more remote.” They assured me that the older population were the ones who could benefit the most from the smart home and they were committed to making them simple to operate.

I could write a lot more about all the new innovations I saw. There were over 3,200 exhibitors, but the most important thing I came away with was the belief that these great innovations are going to help us stay self-reliant and living longer in the place we choose.

Best, Thair