Bia: Muscle strength as a ‘building block’ for healthy ageing women
Bia is an app that helps to keep women in midlife healthy, happy and productive in the workplace. It is co-designed by women, for women. It distils the essential, evidence-based components of exercise that are essential for the health of women in midlife. It provides a clear, motivating, structured programme to follow and is underpinned by exercise and behavioural science.
About the project
Women in midlife experience a unique set of challenges; they may be at the peak of their career with significant responsibility, they may also still have caring responsibilities for children at home, and may also be acquiring caring responsibilities for older parents. This can generate many demands and stress; all of which can be compounded by complex peri-menopausal changes, symptoms of which include musculoskeletal pain, anxiety and poor sleep. The result is that something has to give and many experienced women leave the workplace in midlife, long before their male counterparts. This causes a major problem for employers who increasingly recognise their role in ensuring that women are supported to stay in work when they are at the peak of experience and productivity.
The technology is being development by Sheffield Hallam University in partnership with industrial partner Westfield Health. Westfield Health delivers evidence-based health and wellbeing solutions for the workplace that support people and communities to thrive. It has over 4,000 employees and 9,000 corporate clients and currently has fitness and wellbeing contracts in Netherlands, UK, Austria, Germany and Belgium. Services include wellbeing centre management, physiotherapy, health screening, wellbeing coaching and education, research and consultancy services, and health insurance products. Westfield Health has a keen interest in digital product development.
Product
Exercise is an effective way of managing many of the mentioned issues but it is an under-used approach. Despite there being a multitude of offers, programmes are often time-consuming and complex, and none are specifically designed to meet the needs of women in midlife. Bia is an app that helps to keep women in midlife healthy, happy and productive in the workplace. It is co-designed by women, for women. It distils the essential, evidence-based components of exercise that are essential for the health of women in midlife. It provides a clear, motivating, structured programme to follow and is underpinned by exercise and behavioural science.