by Tom Tobin
Back in the day while I was still using a flip phone with physical buttons, my dear life-long friend (name withheld to protect his identity) called me and said, “Tom, you need to get an iPhone.” To which I replied, “How does a totally blind person interact with a touch screen?” My friend replied, “I don’t know, but there is this thing called VoiceOver.” Of course, I had no idea what he was talking about and I balked, hedged and otherwise poo-pooed the idea.
So, a few weeks went by and he called me back and said, “Tom, I’m so adamant that you need to be using an iPhone, I’m going to purchase the phone for you and put you on my plan for one year.” So, he did just that!
In fact, as I was walking out of the Apple store, he called me on my new iPhone and I was so clueless I didn’t even know how to answer a call, so I ended up calling him back with much embarrassment, but thus began a journey with a device that would revolutionize my life and give credence to the cliché, “You don’t know what you don’t know!”
So, I’ve been a dedicated iPhone user for these many years now, and continue to learn new ways that this incredible technology so positively impacts my life on a daily basis and continues to allow me to do so much on one device, instead of the old way of having multiple devices for a variety of blindness (and non-blindness) related tasks!
Probably the single most significant impact that iOS has had on my life (and others) is in the ever-emerging Durable Medical Equipment (DME) space. Since today’s insulin pumps and continuous glucose monitors have migrated to smartphone apps to interact with these devices, my level of access to better manage my diabetes has improved significantly and has, without a shadow of a doubt, improved my overall quality of life, something you simply cannot put a dollar figure on!
So, just imagine how that pivotal day so many years ago has changed my life today and what it means for the future of health care regarding advancements in medicine, integration of artificial intelligence and the very strong possibility of curing so many chronic diseases that currently hold back human evolution!
So, I say to my dear old friend, that gift and the sentiment behind it has had immeasurable impact on my life, and while “thank you” doesn’t quite cut it, thank you nonetheless!