Surgeon General’s Healthy Apps Challenge: The Winning Apps

The results of the Sur­geon General’s Healthy App Chal­lenge high­light the abil­ity of inno­v­a­tive new tech­nolo­gies to pro­vide health infor­ma­tion tai­lored to the needs of the user, and empower the pub­lic to reg­u­larly engage in and enjoy health-promoting behaviors.

Healthy Eat­ing / Nutrition

GoodGuide (avail­able for both iOS and Android). This app makes it easy to get the infor­ma­tion you need about your food, per­sonal care, and house­hold prod­ucts to help you make healthy (and green and eth­i­cal) choices.  You can use the bar code scan­ner to get this infor­ma­tion while you shop and select prod­ucts based on your preferences.

Food­u­cate (avail­able for both iOS and Android). This app helps you make healthy food choices.  When shop­ping you can scan the prod­uct bar code for a quick read on a food’s health value, rep­re­sented by a let­ter grade from A to D, plus addi­tional infor­ma­tion such as nutri­ents and addi­tives. The app can offer health­ier alter­na­tives and com­pare two prod­ucts side-by-side.

Phys­i­cal Fit­ness / Activity

Lose It! (avail­able for iOS; it can also be used on the web). This app helps you achieve your diet and exer­cise goals.  It allows you to set a daily calo­rie bud­get and then prompts you to record your food intake and exer­cise to meet that bud­get.  You also can invite your friends to view your logs on Face­book to boost your moti­va­tion and encour­age one another.
Fit Friendzy (avail­able for iOS). This app encour­ages every­one to be more active by high­light­ing the ben­e­fits of not just tra­di­tional exer­cise but also of tasks like gar­den­ing, danc­ing, house­clean­ing, and snow shov­el­ing.  You can chal­lenge your­self or join in chal­lenges with your friends.  There is also the option to share your exer­cise data with your health care provider.

Map­My­Fit­ness (avail­able for iOS, Black­Berry and Android). This app encom­passes both fit­ness and nutri­tion edu­ca­tion.  It lets you use the built-in GPS of your mobile device to track your fit­ness activ­i­ties. You can estab­lish a train­ing log, record your activ­ity, keep track of calo­ries con­sumed, and share your infor­ma­tion with friends.

Inte­gra­tive Health / Well-being

Healthy Habits (avail­able for iOS). This app rec­og­nizes that good health is not just about keep­ing active and eat­ing health­ily, but also about get­ting a good night’s sleep, think­ing pos­i­tively, and spend­ing time with fam­ily and friends.  It also addresses health issues such as smok­ing, wear­ing sun­screen, tak­ing time for cre­ative activ­i­ties, and reduc­ing stress. You can choose which healthy habits you want to track. .

For Chil­dren

Max’s Plate (avail­able for iOS). This app edu­cates young chil­dren (and their par­ents) about healthy eat­ing. It pro­vides a fun and enter­tain­ing way to learn about good nutrition.

Short Sequence: Kids’ Yoga Jour­ney (avail­able for iOS, Android and Nook). This app has sim­ple instruc­tions for yoga poses for chil­dren and beau­ti­ful illustrations.

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