Apps to Make Dementia Care Easier.

Smartphones and tablets have become integral parts of everyday life. There seems to be an app for everything. Not surprising, there are many smartphone and tablet apps to help dementia sufferers and their care givers address the many dementia-related challenges faced on a daily basis. Loretta Woodward Veney, a motivational speaker and author, whose mother has dementia, shares some of her favorite care giving and dementia apps available today and how they may help, at www.healthcentral.com.  There are apps to help schedule and organize appointments and care, apps to help share events, coordinate activities, and communicate with members of a care giving team, even activity apps to engage dementia sufferers.

You may follow the link here to read the article.

Tips for Navigating Medicare Open Enrollment

Medicare’s annual open enrollment period closes on December 7 this year.  During open enrollment, Medicare enrollees can shop for new prescription drug (Part D) or Medicare Advantage coverage. Medicare enrollees may be able to save hundreds of dollars on premiums and out-of-pocket costs by doing a checkup on their coverage and making necessary changes during the open enrollment period. Surprisingly, few enrollees bother to take advantage of this opportunity to review their existing coverage or make changes.

Morningstar contributor Mark Miller sat down for an interview recently at www.morningstar.com to discuss the potential benefits of annually reviewing your Medicare coverage, and he offers several useful tips to help navigate through the open enrollment period.

If you haven’t yet reviewed your Medicare enrollment options, or you weren’t even planning on doing so, it might help you to take a few minutes (about 8, in fact) and watch the interview to see if there might be something you can do to save money on your health care next year.  You can watch the full interview here.  I hope it helps!