caregivers

Consider this gloomy WSJ article about aging. More Americans Are Aging Alone, Who Will Take Care of Them? The premise? “More than 16 million people aged 65 and older in the U.S. live alone. That represents 28% of that age group, almost triple the share in 1950." Whoa!  First of all 20% of the 65+ population is working today. Why? Life expectancy at 65 has risen to the mid-eighties for both women and men, compared to late 60’s, early 70’s in 1950. And a shrinking percentage of Americans live in rural areas today, according to Pew Research. While the article is a compelling description of a heroic organization of underpaid workers serving an Appalachian community, mapping the article to the reality of older adults in the United States today is disingenuous.

Clearly many caregivers are missing out on useful technology.  According to the new AARP Caregiving in the US report, utilization of useful technologies, detailed in a brief report attached here, that could help with care of either children or older adults is below 50% other than smart home tech. Maybe that is the smart doorbell?  Smart TV? --which is just about all you can buy.  Only 10% of caregivers say they own home health safety devices, which probably include a pendant with fall detection or an in-home fall detection device. If these caregivers are living with the older adult, perhaps that makes sense.  If not, perhaps they do not know what they don’t know. Only a third say they use smart home technology (for lighting? Temperature control? Other?). Perhaps the AARP site for caregivers would be of benefit.  Lots of information there.

This report is published every five years – and it is (still) dismaying.  The new report, Caregiving in the US 2025, was published this week. The previous report was surveyed in 2020. The bottom line of it is the sheer number of adults (63 million) who provide care to an adult family member or child with a medical condition or disability in the past 12 months. Most of this care is unpaid.  Some are leveraging state or national programs to pay family caregivers, and one-third, likely higher income, hire outside help. The report’s focus is on the 59 million who provide care for an adult. So what has changed in terms of tech use? If usage penetration is a metric, there is some progress. For example:

What caught our attention in 2024 in the older adult aging and health tech market?  By the end of the year of 2024, heading into CES 2025, AI, or at least the term ‘AI’ has caught the eye of all, from scammers to overpriced startups to overspending investors.   It all is reminiscent of previous years of hysteria over the web, the cloud, voice, and so on.  As we head towards CES 2025, where an enter new class graduates into the booths and brouhaha, here is a look back at 2024’s most notable blog posts:

The 2024 Market Overview of Technology for Aging will be published during CES 2024.  As part of that update, it is worth considering changes that occurred in the past year that matter to older adults and families. Caregiving and other demands of an aging population gained significant government attention and new initiatives during 2023. While some of the actions below will require further funding action from Congress, all of these represent forward momentum for long-needed changes. It is likely that technology enablement and access will be components of each of the initiatives as they evolve.  Categories include: