Hello all! I am alive not doing all that well. I’ve been having a COPD exacerbation for a few weeks now. It must be seasonal related because it was right around this time last year that I had to quit my full time job for the same reason. Well, that and not being able to talk. Kind of helps when you work for an Answering service. I haven’t really done anything artsy or even knitting. Some days just eating feels like it takes all of my energy.

I got a call from my insurance company about a week ago letting me know they’re working with a pharmacy now that will deliver my medications right to my door and they will be packaged for each day and the times that I take them, and the best part is, it is no charge. One of the worst things is not feeling well and having to pick up prescriptions and while Walmart will deliver a lot of mine, they won’t deliver anything that is considered a controlled substance. I had to go over all of my medications with the insurance company and it took me a bit to gather up all of my prescriptions, some are as needed, some are once a day, some are a couple to a few times a day. As I was grabbing all the bottles I was like, there has to be a better way for me to keep track of all of this. So,…I made an app. 😂

More like, I’m still working on an app. I think I’m almost finished. It was supposed to be a basic, local storage app but because I have my laptop, iPad and my phone, I wanted to be able to have a way to store the data and have it automatically update on each one, so I needed a back end and a place to store the data. Then I wanted to add an alarm option because even if my meds start coming prepackaged, I still have to remember to actually take them. Then I wanted to add symptom tracking for when I see my doctors. And speaking of doctors, I wanted a calendar in the app to keep track of doctor appointments. Then I though, well, this is all fine but, I need a way to export it so I added a print option. And because of having data and private information I then added secure log in with both email and password and Google log in. And it became a whole thing. It has taken time due to not having much energy, but the good thing is, I mainly only need to move my fingers when I’m working on it. It’s a web based app but it can be installed on any device with an actual icon that will open as an app not in your browser. You can add your primary care doctor’s contact info, and even call right from the app. I added speech to text for users that have trouble typing due to arthritis, etc. I’m planning to add language options when I know what I have now all works smoothly. I’m still working out some bugs as I find them and I’d love to have some testers check it out also for feedback and input on things they would like to see in an app like that. Initially I thought I could sell it as a one time fee app but due to having the back end, eventually I would need to start paying for that data storage and that could get expensive depending on how many people were actually interested and wanted to use it. What started as just a way to track my meds became a real app, aptly named Medcal for meds and calendar. I’d actually be excited if I didn’t feel so crappy lol.

Anyway, hope everyone is doing well and creating! I hope this exacerbation ends soon. Not much they can do other than what I’m already doing so it’s more of a waiting game. Sharing some pics below of the app interface. 😊