AlzCare – Empowering Families through Alzheimer’s Caregiving

Caring for a loved one with Alzheimer’s is emotionally and physically demanding. Over 100 million caregivers worldwide struggle with managing medication, tracking symptoms, ensuring safety, and balancing their own well-being. Many feel isolated and overwhelmed.

AlzCare is designed to alleviate these challenges, providing caregivers with smart alerts, AI-powered guidance, and a strong support network—so they can focus on compassionate care.

Through user research, including interviews, field studies, and secondary research, we identified key pain points: 1) Tracking symptoms: Many caregivers use paper templates to monitor changes. 2) Safety concerns: Wandering is a major worry, posing serious risks. 3) Emotional stress: Caregivers often feel isolated and need support. To address these, we designed AlzCare’s core features considering functionality and emotional well-being in mind. The visual design includes a warm color palette to create a calming experience, high-contrast and larger typography for accessibility, and voice input for hands-free AI interaction.

Introducing AlzCare, a companion app designed to enhance both patient care and caregiver well-being. By integrating AI-powered guidance, real-time alerts, and a strong caregiver community, AlzCare provides the support system that caregivers need. Our key user-centered design innovations include: 1) Home + Care Tab: A centralized hub for tracking medications and symptoms, reducing errors, and supporting timely medical decisions. 2) Alerts: Real-time notifications when a patient wanders beyond a safe area, helping caregivers respond quickly. 3) Ask AI: A specialized, trained AI that provides reliable answers on care techniques, symptoms, and crisis management. 4) Community: A space for caregivers to connect, share resources, and receive emotional support. 5) Family Coordination: Shared task lists and scheduling tools to streamline caregiving responsibilities across family members.

AlzCare empowers caregivers, easing their burdens while improving patient care. As technology advances, we hope to honor and support caregivers—many of whom work tirelessly and unpaid—by providing them with the tools they need to navigate this journey with confidence and support.