PBA for tracking baby data!

Steph and I got this as a gift from our ex-roommate Patrick.  A thoughtful gift, right?  My immediate reaction was to throw the thing against the wall and scream to the heavens “How did any babies survive before technology?”

Steph wanted to try it out, and being a good husband, I “wanted to want” to try it out too.  I hated clicking the button for the first 2 days, but I soon realized the error of my ways.

Soon after birth (Gavin’s, not mine), we were asked by the doctors (which is standard protocol) to monitor baby pees & poops (there’s that word again).  We created a spreadsheet and taped it to the fridge.  Steph filled out the spreadsheet religiously.  I was too lazy to go to the kitchen every time I changed a diaper in the baby’s bedroom.  Enter the PBA.  Not only was it portable, it required only one hand to search, input, and review data.  It was easy to use and didn’t require any user’s manual.  (I hardly ever read user manuals.  I like to test my thinking skills first…)

Within a couple days of  using the PBA, the spreadsheet on the fridge came down and everything was input into the Onaroo.  Even the dirty details about the diaper mess.  When we needed to make our doctor’s visits, we just brought the handheld with us.

The biggest issues that were solved with the PBA was when we needed to share Gavin’s I/O schedule (I/O = input/output = food/waste) with doctors or caretakers.  For instance, during the first few months, we had two babysitters helping us take care of Gavin.  If we had to log what each babysitter said to us and add our own information to the I/O log and keep handing this stack of information back and forth to one another, you can see how this can get out of hand.  With the PBA, we just dropped Gavin off with the babysitter and she could instantly check what feedings (and other events, like napping) transpired as far back as the data went.

There are plenty of features in the PBA and though we didn’t use all of them, we were happy to have them available.  Extras such as a temperature chart.  If Gavin would have been sick, we would have been able to log and track that information, if need be.

We used the PBA from a few days after Gavin’s birth to about 7.5 months old.  FEED, DIAPER, and SLEEP were the three charts that we used most often.

The PBA made life easier for us and I will definitely use the Onaroo again for our next baby.

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Overall Rating:  8 Worms   

Ease of Use:  10 Worms 

Performance:  8 Worms 

Features:  8 Worms 

Durability:  7 Worms 

Manliness:  10 Worms 

Retail Price:  $49.95

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Pros:

Easy to use.  One-handed operation.  Display is easy to read.  PC upload and capability.

Cons:

Size.  Buttons are harder to press after ~7 months of use (maybe worn contacts on circuit board?).  Interface can be a little slow to turn on.  Battery life is average.

Things I would modify:

I would probably add some other features in the FEED portion of the PBA, such as charts for introduction of solid foods.  The PBA is a bit cumbersome and a smaller sized unit would be nice.  This is nowhere near the power and capability of a smartphone, yet it’s a good bit larger.  (Maybe that’s done to keep costs down, I don’t know.)  To get the user to plug baby’s data into their PC, get that USB jack to provide power and recharge a battery pack in the PBA.

The Onaroo Personal Baby Assistant can be found here:

http://www.americaninnovative.com/products/pba.php