Short memory...? Ep92 Recallify - part 1

(upbeat music) - Welcome to short memory. What caused eye this week was a recoolify. - So we got an eNews letter from an organization called the N-I-H-R, which is the National Institute for Healthcare Research. - Yes. - We actually got one in this country. Very little known, but it's, yes, the Re-Saxon-A-Hole Institute. But one of the areas of research they do is they have a kind of health tech research center. They've got lots of different research things going on. But the health tech one is quite interesting. So we got this user, when it's got the title, it says, "Bringing Tree." And I thought, "Bringing Tree." - Yeah, that's right. Big head underneath, "Join Research Study." - Yeah. - Yeah, so, yeah. - Okay. - So it's a logo of Essex University. And underneath that, you said, "Living with Brain Injury, try Recordify a new app to support your recovery. Join our research study and help shape the future of rehabilitation." - Yeah, so, I mean-- - Well, I mean, that's really-- - Ticks, I'll bring you. - Tick, go, exactly. - Tick, go, yes. So there's a picture of the app. And with the words, "Test a new rehabilitation tool to contribute to research that helps others." Well, as to know-- - Just written for us. - Written for us, because the wording for our generic intro for what memory is, investigate what's new in Brain Injury Research. And here is an opportunity to investigate, become part of the research. I mean, how great is that? So you signed up for this. - Yes, I have. - Well, and there is an app. There goes on your phone, - Brilliant. - And how did you get the app? How do you join the study? - So I had to fill in a few sort of questions. So my age, my birth, gender, all of those sort of general queries. And then I got asked to join a Zoom call, it's for a Google call, something like that. - Oh, yeah, okay. - So I was on Wednesday, so I did that. I was also luckily enough put in, because there's a control group and an app group. So they can compare how the air improvement has gone on, whether they use the app or don't. - Oh, I see, so it's a kind of proper research. - Yes. - So anyway, you have a group of people who aren't on air. - Control. - Yeah, the control group. - Yes. - Which they, I can't say mention something, which is TAU, a towel group. I tried to, but I remember in the small print, it's just treatment as usual. - Oh, okay. - Treatment as usual. - But of course, they have to make it into a three-explanatory because they're academic, so they love doing all that. So treatment as usual, TAU, so you won't put in that group, you'll put in the app group. - Okay, fantastic. - So yeah, so I had a call and basically had to go through a lot of fill out a form, which was probably about six, seven pages long. - It goes with a two-year period. - It's for a good cause. So yes, so I had to do that. And then I basically had to phone call with this person, sort of told them because you had, when you would contact them before, you'd said to them about our podcast and what we were doing, and that we want to talk about it. So she knew that my name was who you had spoken about. - Right, yeah. - And so I told her a bit about the podcast itself. Apparently she's listened to a few episodes, which is always good. - Okay, always good. - Say yes. And basically she sort of had a rundown. So you were given a YouTube video of an app. You can sort of have an idea of what it's about. - Yes. - And then I was told, once I'd logged in with the free eight weeks I've got. - So this is going to last for eight weeks. - Yes, so an eight week study. - I'm going to track you what you do on this app. - Yes, I guess people who haven't got the app. - Yeah. - And see if there's much. - So what are they hoping to find from this Recording Five thing? - So basically from what I understand and what I've had a look at, there's it's basically a way for all ADHD as well as people who've had straights and brain injuries. - Right. - Use this app. So it's been live for about a year and they're now able to do this. - Okay. - So they're wanting to see if there is a big improvement between people who don't use the app. And people who do. So for example, I have the option. So if I've got a podcast idea that I'm going to do, I, you're not with me. And I'm in the middle of nowhere. I can voice note here. So it's basically the same as voice note on your phone on WhatsApp. So you can voice note on it. You can save it as a reminder. And then later on you can share it to WhatsApp or something like that. So I can send it the idea to you. So you've got it as well. - Right. - So yeah, I'd be really interested to look at that. Also, you can set reminders. So for example, it's sort of like a calendar. It's how I think about it. Sort of like a calendar. But it's all in one place. So like a calendar, you can only put things like a little bit of text in. So this is like you can put voice notes in. Read it back to you. So it's a lot easier for me to use it. So yeah, so I've got tasks. So I can set tasks. So if I've got a call next week on Friday with Charlie, she told me when it was, what's how it was. And rather than putting in the calendar, I put it as a reminder on my phone in Recalifier. - And my hope will then be that it reminds me, like it pops up as a message saying, "You've got a call at 12 o'clock." - So it's kind of a prompting system. - Yes. - Okay, that's quite a clever idea. But it's rather than having to use two or three different apps in your phone. - Yeah. - I would have to just now use just the register. - Just the way up. - Well, I can see how that will be a huge improvement because it took me an all for long time to work out how to use all the different apps after my stroke. It was just impossible to negotiate through all of this. So if it's all in one place and it's a kind of like a reminder system, a calendar system and a note-taking system, which I would interact with each other. - So you're saying an idea and it will be kept on there. - Yes. So you can see my reminders that I've already put in. - Okay, all right. - Recalify call and I can press that and it will tell me, because it generates AI summary of what I've done. So it's like I did a voice call and then it changes it's just for a text on AI. So to make a summary of what you're saying. - Oh, right. - So for example, if I had, if I wrote, we did the whole podcast on it, it would sort of take away all the important bits. - And try that. - So you could be burbling on as someone who's had a stroke. - Yes. - But the AI element, because it pissed me in an AI element. - It's got AI generated text summary. - It will then summarize it for you and send it back. So if you were gabbing on about, I mean, to see a dentist or a doctor or something for an appointment, it would take to all those transformations. We can just do it for you, put it in its correct place and then prompt you all the day to the week to the day that you need to do it. - Yes. - Well, okay, I can see that. - So I can hardly fail to win, can't I? - So yeah, so for example, I've got this summary schedule with Recalify Friday at 12pm and then I've got, this is the text or the voice note that I sent myself. So hopefully it will pick it up. Friday at 12pm next week, me is my call with Recalify. - So it then, so that sort of pause, that sort of not really, remembering properly, it takes and it just has a summary of, so a very quick text, which is, it's very handy. - It's good for someone who's had a stroke. But as well, apparently, it's good for people who have ADHD, who might have memory loss, because memory issues or what am I not? - Time management. or they can go on and on and on and then it's like, "Oh, what was I talking about?" Like, you know, that sort of thing is very useful. So I will carry on using this app and how are they gonna judge the difference between you as you were before and after you've usually free with 'cause there are kind of, you can have an exit program or something where they say-- So I basically have to fill out the form again once I finished. Right. So that form that I had to do yesterday, I have to do again. And they have lots of tasks, which was like, "Are you feeling anxious? Are you feeling depressed? Are you feeling?" So, you know, a lot of those they can then judge to see if those have improved that the rat would qualify-- - Right, right, right, right. - --and have got-- - --outtake away part of that sort of overload of information you've got to remember as a normal human being. - Yes. - So it's almost similar to using Alexa as a, "I don't need to worry about my alarms. I need to-- I can remember-- Oh, I've got to remember 10 minutes of my food 'cause it's cooking." - Wow, okay. - So it's using that aspect of recalphite-- I guess is how they're going to judge it. - Right, so, as you know, I'm a great level of lists. - Yes. - A list? - Yeah. - lists of lists of lists. And it took me years and years and years to get used to doing the calendar on my phone. - Yes. - And inputting stuff in the correct place. And a paper diary, which-- - Yes. So this seems to take all the kind of agony out of all of that. - Because if you just say something-- - Yes. - And it then slots it in for you. - Yes. - All of that is gone because it goes straight from-- - And also-- - And also to that. - I haven't tried it properly yet, 'cause I only got it last night. But from what she said, I think, if you say, for example, very simple shopping list, oh, okay, I need milk, I need this, I need that. If you just put it in, it will bullet point every single item that you recommend or say that you need to remember. - Yeah. - And it will remind you. So you say, I need to remember for next Thursday, because that's when I'm going shopping. - So is the kind of a-- - Well known voice thing in the house. - Yeah. - It's got that element as well. - Yes. - But it's much more personal to you. - Yeah. - To you. And it integrates you with everything else that's going on in your life. - Yeah. - How wonderful is that? - Yeah. - Okay. In terms of the interface itself, it's kind of conventional app. - It seems to me quite pretty, isn't it? - Yeah. - And with a purple. - Seems to be very simple as well, which, as we know, is very good for people who've had strokes. - How about the font size? I mean, it looks quite small. - Yeah. - So I mean, for me, that's not a problem, because I use my text to speech apps. - Oh, I can do it with that, and rather than having to try and read it. So you're reading through Calify RecallingFight app using your text to speech. - Text to speech. - Element of your phone. Yeah, okay, got it. - And of course, you're playing your back at five times as normal. - Yes. - Because you apparently can do that. - Yes, of course. But I would imagine that you probably can adjust the size, because normally you can adjust the size of things. I haven't done that personally because it's not needed for me. But I'm sure, at some point, if you want me to, I can try it to see if that works. But it's basically one main page, and it has tasks, it has the cordings as well, so you can easily access all the recordings that you've done. So yeah, so it's a very simple, straightforward app. I'm sure there are certain things that are a bit more complicated to do, but then you've got this other, so we've got the homepage, which is one page, and you've also got then a timeline of all the recordings you've ever done. So, at the moment, I've got two, but you can then record more, you can have a look, you can search. So apparently, you can search for, right, okay, I know that I have a call tomorrow. So you put call in the search bar, and then the call, Recalify call comes up instantly. So it's hopefully very straightforward and easy for people to use. So you don't have to keep going down through the layers, so just speed the way it is. It's all there right on the page as well. So even if it's just a random word that you're like, "Right, okay, I know that I used that word in there. I used call, I used recalifier, I used it just searches all of those uses of the word, and then you can find them." So yeah, so it seems very positive. It seems like it could be very useful for people to try. So a quick question then. Do you think you would have been able to use it say two years after you had a stroke? Would you have had enough brain power to be able to saw how to use that app? I, because at that point I was using the text to speech on my phone, which is basically it's inbuilt to every single phone device. And your eyes were really not in a good day. Not great, not great there. So now I'm going to, with a combination of using the speech function, and also just having a look, I can use both now, rather than just having to stick with the text function, the speech function. So I feel like, yes, I probably could have used this. It would have been more difficult, and it would have been more difficult to try and remember to use it as well. Okay, to recall if I, yeah. Well, yeah, okay, I can see that. But remembering to use the app to remember, it's going to be your first. It will be a lot easier than like, okay, I've got my calendar in one app in my phone. I've got lots of other apps. I've got, I used to have notes on my phone, so I would make notes of things I needed to do on my app. I know, I've got them. And now I could just go, right, okay, I'm going to just use this. Yes. All right, so it's all in one place. It's interesting, one of our very early podcasts was with Dodgers Gotford Ferguson about memory. And he was talking about, obviously, outsourcing the brain. And it suddenly strikes me that this is a kind of organizational tool outsourcing the brain, where you don't have to think too much about all of this. It's kind of in the background, it kind of organizes for you. Well, it is. Yes. It's just have to input the first bit of information. So how I would think about it is that so Alexes are very useful, very good, but they're at the home. Yeah, they're in the home. So if something like food alarm, reminder, um, remind us of that, but you have to be at home because if you're out and the reminder goes off, you don't necessarily hear it. Or I'm sure that there is a way on the Amazon app that you can probably do it, but I've never found that. So it's for me, like, so I know that we have a reminder sometimes it's like, right, okay, I need to call the GP at 10 o'clock and at 10 o'clock, I'm out walking the duck. So I then forget. Yes. Whereas if I had a call that I needed to call on my real caliphate app, it would come up on my phone and I would be like, oh, oh, okay, I need to call the GP. Very interesting. And so I feel like it's, as it's in your phone, it's much too, it's much handy because I live next to my phone at all times. I find it, if I, if I'm on my phones on charge and I take stand out, it's like, oh my god, where's my phone? I can't, I left it charging. So for me, it's very, very, very rare not to be with my phone at all times. And so for me, it's definitely an easier opportunity. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is going to be quite an interesting study. Yeah. Because the idea that you can somehow do one of the things which has been the being of both our lives, which is kind of any kind of organizational ability that I gave up, after my children said, oh, you need to get Alexa. Yeah. That whole thing, I couldn't get on with that. Yeah. I couldn't get on with that. You confused the hell out of me. With this, because it's closer to me, so to speak, is wingsword. I think you're going to be shouting, so I'm into the room. I couldn't get me head right. So, I can see this would work quite well. Yes, I mean like I love electors like I've got three in my house I don't think I can live without them anymore. It's just past my life. Yeah, I listen to music with them. I set reminders of like oh I put them up and on so give me 15 minutes to warm up. Would that do a similar thing? I don't know. So that's an experiment yet to do? Yes, I don't think I'm not sure that it would do the mundane things as well as save electors do. But I think it can do. It's almost that niche of like when you're out, when you're sort of the in between things you're like, "Oh I just need to pop a reminder on." Rather than having to go right, okay, I need to find my calendar, I need to have a look at the day. And I still to this day get my click day like Wednesday the fourth for example and then put something in, put it in Wednesday fourth and then suddenly it's like, "Oh it's on Wednesday, it's Tuesday the third." Oh, how did that happen? Yeah, I know, yes. So for me I think this is going to be helpful to sort of alleviate any of those issues. Yeah, and also it's one thing because I just have to, I can just go, "Oh I need to remember that so I can record." Because it's like record is on the first homepage. Right. So you just record it and you're like, "Okay, I've got, remember meeting into like job interview between 12 and 1 on Saturday." And it's taking that in and it's going to put it in your diary so it'll be in your diary bit of it. And also it can, apparently link to your calendar itself as well. So I've got to experiment with it a lot more. Absolutely. I've got to play around with it and see what its limitations are and what it can do. So what do you think they're hoping to get out of this study? I mean at the end of it, I mean I don't know how many people are on the study. That was in quite a few. But I mean at the end of this study, which I presume is some kind of feasibility thing, is the idea that they do a whole, they said what? No, they didn't tell me, I just think from what they said and from what I understood and remember from yesterday, was that they wanted to see if it helps people with their recovery of stroke. Right. So it's a broad aim. Yes. But I'll see if next time I can get some more because I might be able to Yes, well there's going to be a fuse, the Recallify app to record the call itself. Right, we'll see. Oh, okay. My, all of my phone ways of recording wouldn't work when I did the call. Right. So we'll see if that works behind it. So you could use Recallify to record the phone call between you and Recallify. Yeah. And then it would, and then I'll send it to you. And it would, it would press it down. Yeah, using AI into the same points that you need to remember and send on to me, which you could send through the app. Yeah. Fantastic. So no, so it's, it looks very positive. It does, isn't it? And it's nice to be part of a research project where we were actually contributing to, as they say, you know, reshaping the way we have been able to take you and might be done. This is brilliant. And so it's from the University of Essex. Yeah. The two names I've found are Dr. Sarah Ruderbeck, R-U-D-E-P-E-C-K, and Professor Andrew Bateman. So they seem to be running this study. I presume it's just a local to the University of Essex at the moment, or this part of England. So presumably there will be a bigger, per-station wide version of this. And we'll have to keep up with it. So I'm, so put it into your recording fly, that we're going to do another episode on this, and find out how we're getting on. Perfect. Yes, I'll do that now. Speak soon. (upbeat music)