healthcare

mHealth -- is it a teaspoon to stem the tide of healthcare spending? So healthcare costs climb to 20% of GDP, and at the same time so climb market expectations and a boatload of silly stuff - like this latest -- crowd-testing of mHealth apps. Don't you love it?  Crowd testing for what flaws may be present in my step or calorie counting app of choice? What if 10 people test -- do we still release? But maybe low-cost or no-cost testing is the way to go. So many apps for wellness! What's a person to think who wants to be well and healthy or maybe an under-35-year-old tech wannabe who wants to be wealthy by getting some wellness crowd-sourced app funding? This new and over-hyped 'industry' of thousands of downloadable health and wellness apps (40,000 apps just in iTunes) must be, one supposes, good for the economy. Why? Entrepreneurship like this helps software developers maintain optimism even in the face of other sour economic indicators.

Smart phone plans: a super-sized way for carriers to make a buck.  McDonald’s now has to tell you the calories in a Big Mac, but Verizon and AT&T don’t need to warn you that watching videos on your phone will suck up the monthly minutes on your data plan faster than a vacuum cleaner picks up dirt. So while only 11 percent of the 65+ have smart phones, they are part of the 50% of households that have one or some.  Instead of being told upload-download speeds, storage capacity on the phone, and how to video conference the whole family in, how about giving you a WARNING sheet that shows price equivalents (like calories) of the various activities you think you want -- and how these activities fit into or drive up charges beyond your data plan? How about handing you a sheet that outlines all hidden costs? If that doesn’t make you blink, then ask what percentage of customers exceed these plans and what the average monthly bill is for customers with the type of phone you're considering?  And if that data doesn’t make you blink, you obviously can afford to both buy dinner and own the phone.

If asked, older adults are content with their lives. Is life good? So concludes a new poll: "USA TODAY partnered with United Healthcare and the National Council on Aging to gauge the attitudes of Americans age 60 and above. And, surprisingly, most are content with their finances, their health and where they live, and most are optimistic about the years to come: "75% of seniors in their 60s expect their quality of life to get better or stay the same over the next five to 10 years." But do those surveyed really have reason to be optimistic, or with a stated median net worth of $212,000, which includes the value of their house, is this self-delusion?