Surely you know someone with a “white noise” machine.

Those are the contraptions that generate a wall of amorphous sound, often to block out unwanted sounds that disrupt sleep, but also employed because people have become convinced they reduce stress.

Who uses them? Busy executives, stressed-out lawyers, or — and now we’re going to talk about real stress — Moms and Dads.

Turns out that they might not work as well as other methods. In fact, a spectacularly popular “Mommy blog” has just featured information on a sound-based sleeping aid that seems to have a better handle on what people of all ages need to really relax, unwind, and sleep well.

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Maybe you’ve got an allergy — or just an item or two which don’t fit with your new dietary regimen. How can you find out which restaurant meals are sure to contain the ingredients you want to avoid?

Now a new and innovative mobile app is in development. Yes, there’ll soon be “an app for that,” if Bleyd, a Florida-headquartered app development firm, has anything to say about it.

The proposed app — for which fundraising is being conducted via Kickstarter — will identify which restaurant meals contain allergens.

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The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) announced this week that it has updated its award-winning Child Health Tracker app.

For the month of February, the organization says, the app will be offered to parents free of charge. The app is regularly priced at $4.99.

“In addition to giving parents the power of on-demand access to their child(ren)’s health information via their smartphone, the AAP added valuable features such as a medication tracker module that allows parents to post medication information for each of their children, set alerts, add dosage information, note side effects, etc.” the AAP said in a provided statement.
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With the United States now declared Ebola free as of this writing, the media hype surrounding Ebola in the U.S. has simmered down a touch.

According to no shortage of healthcare experts, a potential Ebola outbreak was stopped in its tracks thanks, at least to some degree, by a text-messaging program originally intended for patients with diabetes.

Although texting alone didn’t stop Ebola from becoming a domestic pandemic, Davy James of Pharmacy Times noted that the only Ebola case in Senegal was confirmed in August and from there a massive public awareness campaign began when the World Organization and Senegal’s Ministry of Health sent out 4 million SMS warning the public regarding the dangers of Ebola and how to prevent its spread.

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One of the most searched for health related applications on iOS or Android today is that which would help suffers of ankle sprains deal with or recover from their injury.

But practical apps that could do any legitimate good for ankle sprain patients are almost entirely lacking altogether. Why? Because there are, indeed, some limits to mobile health technology.

“The biggest misconception about mHealth,” says Jessica Reins, a healthcare worker based in Chicago, “is that there’s an app for everything. And that’s not true. Sometimes, you have to see a specialist.”
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In an effort to deliver a convenient way to pay for patients and a mechanism to ensure adequate payment at the time of services provided, healthcare facilities and medical practices across the country are moving beyond credit cards and checks to invest in mobile payment technologies.

Earlier this spring, Wellero stepped up to the plate with a new offering that makes paying your doctor, lab, hospital or clinic easier than ever via a smartphone app that links patients and providers.

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