A new player in the quantified self trend, Blip Care, just announced two new products to track your health -- a new wireless weight scale and a wireless blood pressure monitor. But the company has a fresh angle: the devices are designed to keep an eye on parents or aging loved ones, no matter how far away they may live. Even better: your parents don't need a smartphone.
Blip Care wireless weight scale ©Blip Care
The company launched the two new products last week on crowd-funding site Indiegogo, with a mission to ship the scale internationally in February for $99. The blood pressure reader is set to ship within the mainland US in time for the holidays for $149.
Both devices are designed to track health data for two people in a household and send it to a family member or caregiver, and the devices themselves are designed not to intimidate a user who isn't tech savvy. Neglect to take your blood pressure reading? You can preset each gadget to chime a built-in alarm to serve as a reminder as well as forward a message to a family member.
Blip Care wireless blood pressure monitor ©Blip Care
A key selling point of Blip Care is that it doesn't require a smartphone to use, although mobile health news tracker Mobihealthnews notes that the company is designing apps for iPhones and Androids to make it easier for connected users to analyze their weight and blood pressure data.
iHealth offers its own high-tech suite of data-crunching health trackers -- a blood pressure wrist monitor, a wireless blood pressure monitor, and a wireless body analysis scale. Fitbit offers the Aria WiFi Smart Scale, which can upload weight, body fat, and body mass index automatically to Fitbit.com for monitoring. Withings too has its own model, the new Wireless Scale WS-30, as well as the Smart Blood Pressure monitor.