reMindA.I.: Harnessing the power of music to promote senior well-being
Music elevates our mood, connects us with our past and provides a host of benefits for our everyday health and well-being. Yet many of the people who could benefit most from music are seniors who may have limited ability to interact with technology.
reMindA.I. provides an enriching, individually curated music listening experience for seniors who don’t understand or are intimidated by streaming music applications; who can’t manipulate headphones or earbuds; and who possibly can’t even remember or articulate their music preferences.
Our subscription-based, end-to-end music listening system features custom curated and individually presented listening sessions that help seniors recapture and enjoy the musical memories of their lives.
Facts
Health Benefits
Reduce stress and ease social isolation with the proven, therapeutic benefits of daily music listening.
Evidence-Based
Custom Design
No commercial music product exists that’s expressly designed to deliver music to seniors.
How it Works
Ease of Access
Seniors have difficulty accessing music via streaming music apps and most personal listening devices.
Senior FriendlyMarket Analysis & Investment Considerations
Features & Benefits
Features:
- Individualized therapeutic music sessions
- Remotely-programmed
- Scheduled, daily activity
- Senior-friendly listening device
- Personalized voice introductions
- Personalized voice reminders
- Voice activated
- Biometric and motion sensors
- Automatic WiFi connection (no ID or password)
- Broadband mobile connectivity (via Bluetooth)
- Secure family network (no robo calls)
- HIPAA compliant
- Guided meditation, audiobooks, soundscapes
Benefits:
- Improve mood, overall health and well-being
- Reduce senior and caregiver stress
- Mitigate loneliness
- Enjoy reminiscence
- Ease anxiety and pain non-pharmaceutically
- Enhance cognition and alertness
- Master relaxation strategies
- Stimulate long-term memory
- Boost mental awareness
- Strengthen neural fitness
- Establish healthier lifestyle habits and behaviors
- Improve awareness – practice mindfulness
- Improve quality of sleep and appetite
Where science meets musical memory
The soothing power of music is well established; music has been shown not only to reduce psychological stress, but to promote healing as well. Listening to music activates our entire brain, creating the potential to improve the way we think, behave and feel.
What most people don’t realize, however, is that not all music provides the same health benefits – indeed, extensive research has shown that individually-curated ‘therapeutic music’ is proven to be far more effective at calming frayed nerves than is music selected based on genre, era or popularity alone.
Study after study validates the power of truly personalized music to enhance mood and memory, especially among older people experiencing cognitive decline. Now, for the first time, any family member or caregiver can provide regular therapeutic music tailored exactly to the senior’s tastes and memories.
How it Works
Caregivers interact with a 15-minute, evidence-based music history assessment – the culmination of decades of clinical and research expertise developed by our Chief Science Officer, Linda A. Gerdner PhD, RN, FAAN – that collects specific information about your senior, such as age, ethnicity, immigration experience and other personal and social milestones.
All information you provide about your senior to help us individualize their listening experience is maintained in compliance with HIPAA.
Our ‘Lifeline Discovery’ curation algorithm processes this information and generates a series of unique, personalized playlists, for different days, times and moods. As your senior listens to the initial music selections, our purpose-designed listening device, the ‘Bandanna’, dynamically gathers more information – from simple commands like “stop” or “skip”, to physical gestures such as nodding or toe-tapping – to continuously fine-tune and improve playlists.
Unbelievably easy to use
reMindA.I. is predicated on the findings of extensive, evidence-based research on both the psychological and physical health benefits of music, as well as the limitations of our oldest family members and patients.
Your senior doesn’t need to touch screens, remember passwords or otherwise interact with our application. The curated playlists are streamed via the senior’s local WiFi network (i.e., in their home or long-term care facility) directly to the Bandanna device.
The Bandanna doesn’t require any fine-motor coordination. The user simply slips it around their neck and listens – the speakers are close enough to the ears for seniors to clearly hear the music without disturbing others in the room. Since there are no headphones or earbuds, the Bandanna is also both hearing aid-friendly and hygienic. When the Bandanna needs recharging, seniors simply place it on the recharging pad – no wires and no batteries to change.
Your voice in their ear
Verbal cues will direct your senior when to use the Bandanna for optimal therapeutic value, and when it’s time to recharge. As the senior’s family member or trusted caregiver, you can record any number of personalized messages, from “good morning, Joan” to “let’s listen to some music now,” to “remember to take your meds”, all in your own voice. Our application will play your messages through the Bandanna at the desired times.
Evidence-based protocol
Over the past two decades, incontrovertible evidence has been documented, supporting the use of individualized music interventions and confirming that daily listening to individualized music offers numerous neural health benefits impacting cognitive, emotional and social functioning both in normal aging as well as in different stages of memory impairment.
It is now well-established that caregiver-implemented music interventions — guided by principles of music therapy —represent a potent, cost-effective, nonpharmacological therapeutic solution, that can be utilized by virtually all seniors and their caregivers, wherever they may live – especially those seniors who love their independence and wish to age in their own homes.
reMindA.I.’s guiding aspiration is to facilitate seniors’ ability to age in place, independently, in the safety and comfort of their own homes, for as long as practicable. Indeed, our core organizational objectives are:
- To promote seniors’ sense of emotional and social connectedness with their loved ones, and
- To provide greater peace of mind to their caregivers.
The Minds at reMind
David Alpert
Co-Founder
While obtaining his Master’s Degree in Social Work, specializing in the needs of seniors, David worked one-on-one with seniors, re-introducing them to the music of their lives.It was this endeavor that led to his understanding that music is being underutilized as an effective, nonpharmacological ‘treatment’ to address loneliness and reduce stress and anxiety in seniors. David is a former ‘Fortune 100’ sales and marketing executive as well as a songwriter and producer.
Ethan Alpert
Co-Founder
Ethan is an experienced business founder and senior executive with a successful track record of building, operating and exiting small and mid-cap enterprises.Ethan is the primary caregiver for his mother, and knows first-hand just how frustrating technology is for seniors. So when Dave told him about his experience helping seniors with music, Ethan was all in. He is a former practicing attorney and investment banker who brings an interdisciplinary perspective to business development and operation.
Linda A. Gerdner, PhD, RN, FAAN
Chief Health Science Officer, Director
Dr. Linda Gerdner has dedicated her life’s work to research related to the care of elders with dementia in an effort to improve their quality of life. She has published extensively in this area, receiving national and international awards for her contributions. Linda has held several prestigious academic positions including, most recently, as an ethnogeriatric specialist at the Center for Education in Family and Community Medicine at Stanford University. In 1996, Linda originated the ‘Evidence-Based Guideline: Individualized Music Intervention for Persons with Dementia’, now in its 6th Edition .
Sergei Iartsev
Chief Technical Officer
Sergei is a custom software developer and technical co-founder with extensive experience recruiting and managing software development and engineering teams.Sergei holds a Master’s degree in innovation management that enables him to bring a combination of technical, product management, business process, marketing and organizational skills to the development of reMindA.I.’s application and device integration.
Kathleen C. Buckwalter, PhD, RN, FAAN
Lead Science Advisor
Dr. Kathleen Buckwalter is widely esteemed for her research in geropsychiatric nursing, rural health, and long-term care. She has a sustained record of achievements relating to the development of conceptual models for the care of persons with dementia and the evaluation of nursing interventions for geropsychiatric populations. Buckwalter has received numerous honors and awards including Excellence in Research and Research Dissemination (STTI), Best Practice (ASA), Distinguished Contribution to Research (MNRS), and serves on multiple review committees, editorial boards, and advisory groups. She has authored over 390 articles, 90 book chapters, and over 100 editorials, reviews, and commentaries, among others.
Advisory Board Members
Dr. Amy Clements-Cortes
Senior Advisor
Dr. Amy Clements-Cortes has extensive clinical music therapy and psychotherapy experience working with individuals across the lifespan including, among others, older adults and individuals diagnosed with dementia, cancer, terminal or mental illness, learning disability, and developmental delay. Dr. Clements-Cortes currently serves on the editorial review board of Journal of Alzheimer’s disease, Music Therapy Perspectives, Journal of Music Therapy, Voices, Approaches: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Music Therapy, and others. She also engages in a variety of voluntary service work to further the professions of music therapy and psychotherapy.
Kendra Ray, PhD
Senior Advisor
Kendra Ray, PhD is currently the MJHS Dementia Program Director at Menorah Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in Brooklyn, New York and Research Assistant Professor at NYU Langone.Her research focuses on paid caregivers and adults with cognitive impairments diagnosed with neuropsychiatric symptoms of dementia for nursing home residents and those living at home. Kendra has more than a decade of experience as a music therapist working with a variety of populations. She is a nationally board-certified music therapist and New York State licensed creative arts therapist.
Phil Muzio
Audio Component Advisor
Founder/CEO Madrigal Audio Labs; VP global engineering/audio business unit at Harman/JBL; 35 year career in audio product development
Targeted Corporate Partners
