AppDate: Mobilise your medical history

In this AppDate, SEAN BACHER highlights MyMedRec, UP Coffee, Documents To Go Version 4, Scanner Pro and Dragon Dictation.

MyMedRec

With MyMedRec, users can share health records with family members, doctors, nurses, pharmacists or anyone else involved in their healthcare. The app provides reminders for users to take their medication and also of any doctors’ appointments. Medication records and immunisation schedules are stored, should a doctor ever need to access them.

Platform: BlackBerry OS 10 and above.

Stockists: Visit the BlackBerry App World.

Expect to pay: A free download.

UP Coffee

The UP Coffee app is a part of a suit of apps designed to work with the JawBone fitness bracelet. The app displays users’ caffeine intake and is then able to work out how much coffee they can drink without disrupting their sleep. After a week, the app rates users, and provides helpful hints should they need to cut down on the coffee. Although the app is more of a gimmick than a practical tool, it is interesting to see how quickly a cup of coffee every now and then adds up over a month – and what impact it has on sleep.

Platform: iOS

Stockists: www.jawbone.com

Expect to pay: A free download.

Documents To Go Version 4

Smartphones and tablets are now at the point where they are able to handle some of the most resource-intensive applications. That said, their diminutive screens sometimes make working on them rather difficult. The latest version of Documents To Go was built with small screens in mind, so makes editing, viewing and creating Microsoft Office documents that much easier. Users are able to zoom in on a particular part of a document for easy editing and reading. A full-screen mode with pop-up toolbars gives just that much extra screen space. The new Office To Go now lets users save their documents directly to the phone or tablet or to a Cloud for collaboration with other employees.

Platform: Android and iOS.

Stockists: Visit the store linked to your device.

Expect to pay: A free download.

Scanner Pro

It is a digital world, with everything needing to be digitized so it can be stored and accessed at a later stage. Many documents also need to be in a digital format so they can be audited. Scanner Pro turns a person’s smartphone or tablet into a professional scanner. Users can scan anything from travel receipts to invoices and apply filters to make them as clear as possible. The app also automatically crops a scan to fit on a page, should it need to be printed, and detects the edges of the page being scanned. All scans are saved as a PDF and can be e-mailed or printed directly from the app.

Platform: iOS although similar apps are available for BlackBerry, Windows Phone 8 and Android.

Stockists: www.readdle.com

Expect to pay: R75

Dragon Dictation

There have been numerous dictation programs over the years, but Dragon Dictate has always been the best since it launched a decade or so ago for PC. The iOS app is no different in that its speech recognition is very accurate, especially when concentrating and properly pronouncing words. It also saves a lot of time when used instead of the phone or tablet’s keyboard to tap out an e-mail. Besides creating documents, e-mails and notes, the latest version of the app lets users post updates to social networks like Facebook and Twitter and it has an option to send reminders to yourself.

Platform: iOS and Android.

Stockists: Visit the store linked to your device.

Expect to pay: A free download.

* Sean Bacher is editor of Gadget.co.za. Follow him on Twitter on @SeanBacher