VitAlz

Managing Alzheimer's Care for Patients and Caregivers

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Inspiration

Each of us on the team has experience with a loved one who suffered from Alzheimer's disease or dementia. We know how heartbreaking it is to see family members struggle with symptoms and understand how difficult it can be to provide care for those relatives. We wanted to provide better support for patients, family members, and caregivers when treating Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease is a type of brain disease that is caused by damage to nerve cells, with the first damaged neurons being responsible for memory, language, and thinking. According to the Alzheimer's Association, over 6 million people in the United States has Alzheimer's disease and approximately 11 million people provide unpaid care for Alzheimer's patients. Since the early 2000s, the rate of Alzheimer's related deaths increased significantly from 17.6% per 100,000 people in 2000 to 37.0% in 2019. As the US population ages, Alzheimer's may be more prevalent. Thus, it's not only important to spread awareness and educate others, but also find ways to improve healthcare and caregiving for those who suffer from Alzheimer's disease.

What it does

VitAlz is an iOS app that helps patients and caregivers be educated on Alzheimer's disease and make care easier. Users login to the app and are greeted to the home screen. To help track tasks and medication intake, users can make and add to a list, which notes the date and time. If the task is set in the future, VitAlz can push a notification reminder. VitAlz provides a fun memory exercise as well called "Al Says." When users play the game, they will be prompted to copy the growing pattern of colored tiles and click them in the right order. The game utilizes sound cues as well to help players remember the pattern. Lastly, there is a resources page where users can learn more about Alzheimer's disease, featuring general information, statistics, risks, and ways to connect to a helpline, donate to the Alzheimer's Association, and see our DevPost for issues.

How we built it

We built our app in Swift using XCode. For the backend of our authentication page, we utilized Firebase to store app login information and home page summaries. We also used Procreate to make our app logo. To make collaboration easier between all of us, we uploaded all of our files on GitHub.

When we started the hackathon, we brainstormed many ideas and one theme that appeared multiple times was healthcare. Our goal for this event was to try something new and create a project we could be proud of, leading us to pursue iOS app development. During our coding process, we split our work evenly into different pages and roles. Aster was in charge of our color scheme and game page, which aimed to be a fun way for patients to exercise their memory skills. Justin worked on our login and authentication page to track users and personalize the app experience. Jonathan created our nutrition tracker to help patients remember their medication and monitor their diet. He also pulled all of our team's app pages together. Riana took care of the background research, drew the project logo, and coded the resources page that provided further information for users.

Challenges we ran into

The main challenge we faced was coding in a language that none of us were familiar with, Swift. Aster and Riana had zero experience doing app development, and Jonathan and Justin were only slightly familiar with React Native.

To overcome this challenge, we spent a few hours looking into tutorials and supporting each other when we figured out how something works in Swift and XCode. Some of the tutorials we found online were outdated, so we had to adapt our code to the current version of Swift.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

One accomplishment that we're proud of is learning a new programming language within 24hrs. It was our goal to step out of our coding comfort zones, and we feel that we picked up the language quickly. Another accomplishment is completing Aster and Justin's first Hack for Humanity hackathon as well as Riana and Jonathan's second time. We had fun together creating this app and enjoyed learning more about Alzheimer's disease.

What's next for VitAlz

The project can be expanded by adding more memory games, healthcare and treatment options, and support resources. In the future, we could also implement a way to connect to a primary care physician, other healthcare staff, hospitals, or healthcare organizations to make Alzheimer's care seamless between all parties involved. Other areas to improve can be found in the way our app looks or updating the information provided in the resources page or even expanding nutrition options in the nutrition page. For users who may not speak English or have an Apple device, we could make the app more accessible by including language options and making the project multiplatform.

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