ATU747 – Assistex with Meira Gross

Hi, this is Meira Gross, and I’m the founder of Assistex. And this is your Assistive Technology Update.

Hello, and welcome to your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson with the INDATA Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. Welcome to episode 747 of Assistive Technology Update. It is scheduled to be released on September 19th, 2025. On today’s show, we’re super excited to welcome Meira Gross. She is the founder of Assistex and is here to tell us about all the great tools they have available to help individuals with dementia and other age-related cognitive impairments.

Also, folks, I wanted to let you know that coming up in October on Wednesday, October 8th, we will have our next INDATA full day training on assistive technology for individuals with mobility impairments. This training is both in-person and online, and we’ll put a link down in the show notes where you can go and register. And then if you attend our training that day, you can even get CEUs for your time. We are very happy to welcome folks from Quantum Rehab, from LifeLyfts and from Superior Van & Mobility to help us out with this training. We’ll also have folks from our home modification AT and AgrAbility programs here at Easterseals Crossroads talking about all kinds of tools that can help individuals with different mobility impairments with travel, work and many other needs. So if you’re interested in attending our next free INDATA full day training, it will be on Wednesday, October 8th from nine AM to three PM Eastern.

But for right now, let’s go ahead and get started with BridgingApps with an app worth mentioning.

This is Ale Gonzalez with BridgingApps, and this is an app worth mentioning. This week’s featured app is called Fear. Fear is an endless runner game for iOS and Android that is designed to be playable by both sighted and blind gamers. The basic idea is that you find yourself running through a forest. However, your journey is made difficult due to the many zombies that would love to catch you and devour your brain, flesh or whatever part of humans zombies like to eat. As if that was not enough of a challenge, you must also jump over undead zombie hands that reach up from the earth and duck under ravens that try to claw at you. If you get hit, the current game is over and you must start from the beginning.

Playing the game is extremely simple. Your character is constantly running forward and cannot be stopped. The longer you survive, the faster you will run. Fear is a great endless runner game that provides a blind person with roughly the same experience as playing something like Temple Run. It is a great time waster if you have some time to kill. Fear is currently available for both Android and iOS devices and costs $3.99 to download. For more information on this app and others like it, visit Bridgingapps.org.

Listeners, on last week’s show, we mentioned that September is National Self-Care Awareness Month. Well, today’s topic fits right into this as well. Our guest today is Meira Gross, and she’s here to tell us all about Assistex and how these puzzles, books, and other activities can assist individuals with memory related challenges. And I, for one, cannot wait to learn more. Welcome to the show.

Hi, Josh. I’m really glad to be here.

I am so excited. I’ve been looking forward to this, to get to learn more about Assistex. But before we do that, could you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself?

Yeah, sure. So my name is Meira Gross. I’m an occupational therapist for 15 years now. I am married, I have four cute kids, at least most of the time cute, and a dog and a cat.

No, I feel you. I have four kids myself. And most days, they’re absolutely amazing, and some days maybe not quite as much. But hopefully, the good always outweighs the bad. Well, Meira, talk about Assistex. I guess let’s start off with, what is it and why was it created?

Sure. So Assistex is my brand that I started five years ago. I was an occupational therapist in nursing homes, memory care facilities, rehab settings, and I was finding very difficult to find activities and games that were designed for people with dementia. So we either took games from a child toy store and it looked childish and it wasn’t exactly what they needed, or the games were too complicated. So that’s where the idea came to start a game and activity company that designs their game specifically for seniors with memory loss from different kinds.

Nice. Very cool. Well, I guess let’s start digging into the different things that you have available and how they sort of help. So let’s start with, I know the first thing that I’ve learned about was the puzzles. So let’s talk about… Let’s start off with them.

Sure. So the first question is, why do you need puzzles for seniors with dementia? Why can’t you just go into a store and buy a puzzle? And the reason for that is they need a puzzle with thick, large pieces and a low count, amount of pieces. And then you’ll find pictures like Mickey Mouse or Choo Choo Train or some other child character from an animated movie, and I feel that’s not so respectful for them. And then if you want pictures that are for adults, that’s way too difficult. You have 500 or 1,000 pieces, and there’s no way possible they would be able to do it.

So I work with some artists that they do the pictures for me, and we just make them into a puzzle with low count, thick pieces. And it’s not just the puzzle. There’s a lot of thought into it. So the box is exactly the size of the puzzle, so that helps them understand where the borders of the puzzle are. You can build it in the puzzle, which makes it even easier. Another thing is we think about the vision loss that some people experience. So the colors are very vibrant, and it’s not all one color, there’s a lot of contrast between the colors. And it’s like a whole activity pack, because each puzzle also comes with a picture book related to the theme. So if we have a puzzle with birds and trees, so it comes with a 28 pages picture book with different types of birds. And not only that, we also have a flyer for the caregiver or family member with 20 conversation prompts about the puzzle to evoke memories, to spark conversation. So it’s a whole kit with a lot of thought put into it.

I love that. I love that you took into account not just things that might help folks with memory, but also, you took into account the maybe visual challenges and other pieces and making things high contrast. And I love that you made it an activity that can be done with others, the book that comes with the conversation pieces, as well as just something a little bit more. And you brought up a good point and something that I noticed with a lot of the items of just you take away the, I don’t know the best words, but kind of the childish components, because I know just from personal experience with family members and stuff, that you’re right. A lot of the way places go is just, “Well, we’ll just use the kid stuff.” And you’re right. That just doesn’t really show the respect. So I like that you put all those different components in there.

Thank you. Really, that’s the whole purpose of this brand, of Assistex brand, to get games that a respectful for the age of the people we’re working with. Even though they need it very easy, it doesn’t have to look like a child game.

Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Well, so that’s kind of the puzzles, which is again how I learned about it. But then as I was learning more, tell us about the games that are out there and available.

Right. So there are different games for different levels of dementia, whether it’s the beginning stage or even MCI, with mild cognitive impairment. So there are some games that are good for their level of the memory decline. So we have the matching game, it’s a matching game of lyrics, so the beginning of a famous song and then they have to match it together. It’s actually two in one. So it comes with a small box of the lyrics matching game and the small box of the idioms and their meanings. So that’s also a great tool for speech therapists out there. They could work really well for people with rehab after they have a stroke and some aphasia to restore some of their language. So it’s also good for therapists, but also just for family members and nursing homes.

And there’s also a matching game that comes with five different boards and you just have to match. It’s very simple. There’s no complicated… We try to simplify it as much as we can. So they have to match the cards onto the board. So there’s boards with six pictures, some with nine, some with 12. So this could also work really good in a group setting if there’s an activity director in a nursing home and she wants to occupy five or six people and has only a few games, so this could also work as well.

And one of the newer games we have is large text jumbo bingo cards, because again, the regular bingo cards, they have very small numbers and they have too many numbers on the cards so people get overwhelmed from it. Too much information. So we just did simple bingo cards with only nine numbers, very large texts, high contrast, black, white, red. So this would be also great for a group setting.

So those are some of the games we have for more beginning stage of dementia. Do you want me to tell you a little bit about our sensory line for advanced dementia?

Yeah. Yeah, most definitely.

Okay. So at some stage, as you know, people really lose the ability to understand language, to communicate, and sometimes we see a lot of anxiety and agitation. I work in nursing homes and memory care facilities. Sometimes you see them touching their clothes or banging on the table or pulling the tablecloth or just picking on their skin. And what we really need is something to occupy their hands, like work through the sensory channel with these people because they can’t understand text or they can’t do anything that has any instructions to it.

So that’s where we have our fidget line, which we have two different kinds of wooden busy boards that they have all kinds of, I don’t even know how to explain it, but stuff to play with your hands. It could be buttons and ribbons and latches of different kinds. You could check it in my website. It could either be lying on the table, or we have a slant on the back so you could adjust it to the height you want. That’s actually one of our bestsellers, which just shows the need and how hard it is to find activities in this stage of dementia. People and caregivers are really, really struggling, really struggling to find a way to occupy their loved one. So we have the wooden fidget boards. And then we have a fabric sort of fidget blanket, and we have a fidget sleeve, and purpose of it is really just to reduce agitation, to occupy their hands and mind in something that they could engage with and it’s not too difficult for them.

And I love all of those, but I feel like the sleeve is something I haven’t really seen before, or anything really like it. Because yeah, I know, again, just from family members and other kinds of things, being places, that you’re right, I do notice those kind of behaviors of pulling and everything. And I love that the sleeve is just something you can just put on, it’s right there. You’re still doing kind of that same behavior, but like you said, there’s nothing bad coming out of it and it still allows them to be able to do everything.

Exactly. It’s good especially for if you see your loved one picking on their hand or even scratching themselves. So it’s a safe way just to cover their hand, and it doesn’t eliminate movement. They still can move with it, but they’re not hurting themselves.

Yeah. That is absolutely super cool. And then just in kind of looking through everything, I also found a kind of therapy doll available through Assistex.

Right.

Can you tell me a little bit about that?

Yeah, I think, Josh, that you should do a total separate episode about doll therapy in dementia, because it’s big and so helpful and it’s such a powerful tool. But I’ll tell you a little about it. I think it actually started in Australia and then spread to the world.

The thing is it’s very controversial, because people say, “How could you give my mom a doll? This looks like a child. It’s a child game. She’s not a baby.” And we opened up this episode with saying we try to make things not childish, but the truth is that some things you can. You can’t make a baby doll look like for adults. But because it works so well and is such a powerful tool, we put that aside and we’re very client centered, person centered. And this is what makes them happy. This is what reduces agitation and anxiety, so we go with it. So it’s not really how it looks in this specific thing, because there’s no way to not make this look not childish.

So I would say from my experience, it works with at least 50% of the people with middle to advanced dementia. It’s such a powerful tool. And you don’t have to do… There’s not too many levels to it, or it’s not too complicated. You come, you present the doll. The doll we sell has a lot of lifelike features. It has a drawn mouth. It looks like baby lips. And the eyes and the fingertips are drawn. So it’s very lifelike. And you just see how they react. It’s usually either it goes well or it doesn’t. You don’t need a second or third trial.

Yeah.

And what you see a lot of times is people that are very, they’re inside themselves, they don’t communicate, they’re depressed, they don’t even open their eyes. And then when you give them the dolls something switches, something switches, you see them open their eyes, you see them smiling. A lot of times, they’re going to sing some child songs that their mom sang to them, and they start rocking the baby and hugging it. And it’s just so magical when you see this happen. I would really highly recommend for anybody from middle to late stage dementia try it.

And it’s evidence-based practice. It’s not just like I’m making this up.

Sure.

It’s evidence based. You could check it up on Google. There’s a lot of articles about it. There’s a lot of videos to show the effect. And this is one of the best ways to occupy somebody with advanced dementia. There’s a lot more to it-

Oh, sure.

… but just for a few minutes about it. It’s really highly recommended. And another product you don’t see because it’s only launching in two weeks is a therapy cat. It’s a cat with lifelike features, added weight. So yeah. That, you will be able to see in my website in two to three weeks.

Awesome. And we can’t wait to see it on there. And yeah, and you brought up a good point. Because yeah, we talked about there is no way to make a doll look like it’s kind of for adults, but at the same time if something works, it works. And that’s the most important part.

Especially in advanced dementia.

Yes.

Especially in advanced dementia where it really is so difficult to find something that does work. So we’ll put the thing aside that it looks childish, and we’ll focus on the fact that it works.

Exactly, exactly. And for the families, for the individuals, for the caretakers and everything, at the end of the day, that’s what matters. And then that’s what matters in the long run. Kind of looking through, I know I can order stuff and get it, but I can also print out some of my own things from the website. Can you tell me about that kind of process and what all is available?

Yeah, sure. So our goal in Assistex is really to have our products and activities approachable to everybody. And I know sometimes games could get expensive. We try not to make our prices too high. Although, I know a lot of companies, that because it’s therapeutical, they make the price very, very high. We do not do that. We try keep ourself a profit so we could keep going, but still make it approachable to everybody. So for people that the games are too expensive, they vary between $18 and $50. Those are the ranges of our products, our physical products.

We have a printable section on our website, Assistexstore.com, where you could buy printable games and activities for just $3. So let’s say I have the matching game, the lyrics and idiom, so you could print them out and just cut the cards out for $3. And this way, you don’t have to spend too much money in it. Or there’s all kinds of easy cognitive worksheets or crafts for people with low vision. There’s also different types of chair exercise, printables, bed exercise guides. There’s also a lot of worksheets for speech therapists out there working with people with aphasia in rehab settings. So there’s a lot of speech therapist worksheets and on and on. Go check for yourself.

I can hear that occupational therapist coming through as you talk about those and all the different things, because you really kind of covered the OT, the PT, and the speech kind of just right there in that statement. So that’s awesome. Because I know sometimes it’s so hard to find meaningful activities to be able to do with your folks and to really help them kind of progress or just stay engaged with all those different things. So I love that those are all available. Now, I hear there’s also a newsletter available. Tell us a little bit more about that.

So the newsletter comes out every two, three weeks. I give a lot of tips for caregivers for people with dementia, whether it’s activities or behavioral problems that you might get into. And I also send a lot of free printables on this newsletter. So if you want to join, just send us an email, it’s info@assistexstore.com. You could also find the email on our website. And you could join our newsletter and get a lot of free printables and good advice to help you on your journey.

Awesome. We will put that email down in the show notes so that folks can easily find that and subscribe. Well, I know you said that Assistex has been around for five years, so you probably got quite a few of these, but could you tell me a story or two about some folks’ experience using some of the puzzles, the games, and the other tools?

Sure. So actually, all my products are tested and designed by me, which is an occupational therapist. So every sample I get from the factory, I try it on the people in the nursing home I still work with. I work in the nursing home once a week, just to stay connected to the field. And all the samples and prototypes, I change accordingly to what I see and how they react.

And I had this woman that she had to get some kind of medical exam, and she was giving the staff the hardest time. She was screaming and hitting them and just wasn’t letting anybody get near her. So I came to her with the Assistex therapy doll and I just presented it to her. And her eyes lit up, she grabbed the doll from me, and she was hugging it. And then I called the staff to see it. They approached her, and she was a different person. She let them do the tests that they needed to do. And it just calmed her down so much that I told them, “Whenever you see she gets into this kind of behavior, give her the doll, or even don’t take it away.” So she actually sleeps with it at night as well. And she’s just a different person since she has this therapy doll.

Absolutely love it. Well, Meira, I know that we talked a little bit about the cats coming out here very soon. Do you have anything else coming down the pipeline that you can share with us?

Yes. What we’re doing now is trying to make bundles of activities for nursing homes and other facilities that they could just give out to staff, or it could be like a stand that a family could take their loved one there and engage them. So it’s going to be boxes with four or five different games in it. Some will be for beginning stage of dementia, some advanced stages. And that’s our next product. So it’s actually bundling some of our products. And also, every two, three months, we come out with more games or more variations for games. So you should stay tuned.

Excellent. I love it, because yeah, then folks can stay engaged and have new things to do. And maybe if something’s not working with somebody right away, they’ll have something new and be able to help them with that. So that is great.

Yeah. Another product we didn’t talk about is our activity book set and our picture book set, which works very well. Our picture book set is actually a bundle of 12 different picture books in different subjects. All of the pictures are adult appropriate, non childish. And it’s for people that really, they can’t read text or understand text, but they have the muscle memory, which usually stays longer, of holding a book and turning the pages. It’s really relaxing for them. So these picture books we give out, it could be in a group setting as well because it comes with 12 different picture books. And they just love turning the pages, looking at the pictures, and they don’t get frustrated by not understanding the text. So that’s one of the other good products we have.

And the other one is for more of the beginning stage of dementia is the activity book set that has 12 booklets of easy word search and easy cognitive worksheets and all kinds of different puzzles and crafts that would be good for people with beginning stage of dementia. And they’re all large text for people with vision loss, which we try to do with all our games if possible.

That’s awesome. Such an amazing array of just different accommodations, different activities, different things to be able to allow folks to really do great things in their spare time that’s going to actually help with therapy and really be able to just assist them. So happy that all these things are out there. You mentioned it earlier, but how can our folks find out more and find all these great solutions?

So you could visit my website. It’s www.assistexstore.com. And in my website, we also have a whole section of blog posts where I give a lot of information, not related to my products, of how to engage your loved one in different activities that you don’t necessarily have to purchase, just with regular stuff you have at home. So there’s a lot of information you could find on my website. And also, you could find the printable section and the physical games on my website as well. You could also get it on my Amazon store or Walmart store. But best to get them on my website, because Amazon sort of cuts all my profit with all the… You know how it goes with Amazon.

Sure. Oh sure, for sure, for sure.

So it’s best to go on my website.

Awesome. And it sounds like there’s so many other kind of resources there from the blog and everything else. So lots of great tools and lots of great things to be able to help folks. Well, thank you so much for coming on today for telling us about just all the great thing with Assistex. I feel like we could go on forever with just probably even some more ways that these tools can assist. But again, I’m just glad that these are out there and available to help folks with memory loss, with dementia and with some other needs as we all try to… Well, we’re all aging, so I guess it might be something that we may all need someday. So thank you so much for putting these tools out there, and thank you so much for coming on and telling us all about them.

Sure, Josh. Thank you for giving me the opportunity.

Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? If so, call our listener line at (317) 721-7124. Send us an email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org or shoot us a note on Twitter at INDATA Project.

Our captions and transcripts for the show are sponsored by the Indiana Telephone Relay Access Corporation or InTRAC. You can find out more about InTRAC at relayindiana.com. Special thanks to Nicole Prieto for scheduling our amazing guests and making a mess of my schedule. Today’s show was produced, edited, hosted, and fraught over by yours truly. The opinions expressed by our guests are their own and may or may not reflect those of the INDATA Project, Easterseals Crossroads, our supporting partners or this host. This was your assistive technology update. I’m Josh Anderson with the INDATA Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. We look forward to seeing you next time. Bye-bye.