MemoTouch

Objective: Help an aging parent keep track of the day

For an older adult living alone, especially one with memory loss, a missed appointment or a forgotten pill can be the difference between staying at home and needing care. Their family can’t be there all day, but they can leave reminders.

Memo turned a tablet into that reminder: a simple, always-on screen showing the date and time, what’s happening today, and messages from family. When Memo decided to part ways with its previous vendor, it brought in Web Ascender to rebuild the product: the tablet app, the caregiver web app, and the website that sold it.

What Web Ascender Did

• Product design - a new interface for the tablet with large type and big touch targets, iPad splash screens, a weather icon set, and the sign-up and web management screens
• The tablet view - the date and time, today’s schedule, to-dos, a scrolling message area, local weather, and touch buttons the user can tap, with icons caregivers can show or hide
• Caregiver web app - family members and aides log in from anywhere to manage appointments with recurring events, to-dos, messages and their style, and a photo album that shows on the tablet
• Alerts and help - timed alerts with alarm sounds on the tablet, and a Help button that notifies the family
• Coordinating care - several caregivers on one account, with notifications when the tablet checks in and a record of each device
• Subscriptions - online sign-up and card billing, with admin tools to manage users, premium accounts, search, and CSV exports
• Moving existing customers over - migrated accounts and device logins from the previous version so tablets in the field kept working
• The website - the marketing site with a product tour, choosing-a-tablet guidance, videos, and sign-up
• Keeping it current - app store releases and server moves as the product changed

The Outcome

Families could set up a parent’s day from their own phone or computer, and the parent saw it on a screen built for them: large, simple, and always on. It’s an early example of the work we still do: a mobile app and a web app built around how real people, including people who aren’t comfortable with technology, actually use them.

The illustration uses sample data.