Dementia and the iPad, 2020 edition

October 31, 2020 1:29 AM

There have already been a few posts along these lines, but they aren't very recent. What are some good iPad apps for people with dementia? In particular, I'd like for them to be able to record themselves talking and telling old family stories. (Doesn't matter to us if they're no longer entirely factual.) They do have a caregiver, but I don't know her comfort level with technology.
posted by Soliloquy to Technology (3 answers total)

Just Press Record will auto transcribe and save to iCloud. This will help you avoid the problem that a family member of mine ran into when she had many many hours of recordings in an old free abandoned voice recording app that did NOT save to the cloud or put proper timestamp on files - it was very tedious and challenging to recover that data, so get the good thing that works instead.
posted by oceanjesse at 5:27 AM on October 31, 2020 [2 favorites]

Also, whichever app you pick Guided Access alows you to lock away everything else on the iPad so it doesn't get activated by accident. When MrsMogur had dementia, I locked down everything but Audible so she could listen to her books without accidentally starting FaceTime or something.
posted by Mogur at 12:11 PM on October 31, 2020 [1 favorite]

Have you considered using an older technology? My mother's decay often had the character of moving backwards in time. She lost the ability to use a cellphone but could still use a landline for instance. I wonder if you should try a cassette recorder as if she has used one ever in earlier life she may still be able to use it while any new technology,(however simple it is to us,) can be impossible to learn. Purely for an example of a cassette recorder.

If I were to try this with my mother I would replace the tape every day so there was no confusion about blank tapes.
posted by Pembquist at 9:34 AM on November 3, 2020