fall prevention, fall detection

Back in the day – 2009.  Seems like, uh, 17 years ago.  Long before the arrival of AI.  Long before smartphone ownership by seniors took off.  One year before the introduction of FaceTime. Back in the day of a new wearable chest strap or belt clip from Halo monitoring that could detect a fall. Back in the introduction day of Healthsense eNeighbor for environment monitoring.  The question that blog post raised was whether it was more important to monitor the person (with a wearable) or the place (in the environment).

Living alone and fall risk.  Today 43% of women aged 75+ live alone – that is, in their own home versus a senior living community. They are more likely to live alone than in other countries.  However, only 9 percent use a personal emergency response device, with no change over the past few years. And for those devices, the key customer is the adult child. And this is despite fall risk which grows with age, though the recent Senate initiative does not differentiate among older age groups.

Falls are a serious problem among the oldest adults.  No one can question the statistics - falls are the leading cause of injury-related death among adults ages 65 and older, and the fall death rate increased by 21% from 2018 to 2024. The Senate’s Committee on Aging has taken note – and this week has launched a request for more tech-enabled innovation. Note the chart below and the increase among the population aged 85 and older.  Also interesting to note that life expectancy has increased during this period – resulting in more people living past age 85.  In fact, mortality rates for older men have been decreasing at a faster rate than for women.

You know the drill – which amazingly seems unchanged.  A bot advises you that many older adults would benefit from a free monitoring service in the event of a fall.  The bot attempts to verify age and then hands off to an offshore call center rep that cannot pronounce ‘Houston’ – an element in the name of the service company, nor can the rep identify the maker of the medical alert service they are offering. Naturally, the rep cannot remove a name from the cold-calling list -- and when asked to do so, hangs up. But there's good news...

Strength-related tech for stronger women?  With all of the digital health startups and corresponding $10 billion in investment, I was curious as to why none are helping women gain strength, which is known to be a direct link to maintaining balance and improving bone health, not to mention helping to prevent falls. I remember a book published years ago called Strong Women Stay Young, specifically focused on older women. The author, Miriam Nelson,  noted the importance of strength training and bone health – and in particular, avoiding osteoporosis, suffered by one in five women aged 50+.  It turns out, none of the 2024 digital health investments that are focused on women ($1.1 billion) tackled this dimension of women’s health.