Ralph Hamilton wears a Steadi-3 Plus device while working in his garden in Wilmington, N.C., in the U.S.AGE-WELL NCE
Aging can take a heavy toll on the human body, especially alongside degenerative or chronic disease.
While tools like walkers and hearing aids have been commonplace for decades, a new wave of assistive and wearable technology is emerging to encourage independent living, overcome mobility challenges and help seniors age more comfortably.
Here are a few Canadian innovations that caught our attention.
A glove that helps people steady hand tremors
Mark Elias was studying structural engineering at the University of Toronto in the early 2010s when he learned how earthquake vibrations are controlled in high-rise buildings. At the time, his grandmother and aunts were living with essential tremor: a neurological condition that causes involuntary, uncontrollable shaking. According to the Cleveland Clinic, essential tremor affects about five per cent of people over the age of 60 worldwide. Elias wondered whether the technology used to steady earthquake vibrations could be applied to help those who suffer from essential tremor.
He joined forces with a friend, Emile Maamary, and the two developed Steadi: a wearable device that uses magnets and springs to suppress and absorb vibrations. Their first commercial product was released in 2022 and a lighter, smaller update was introduced two years later. Now, Elias says that their product has more than 5,000 users. A controlled evaluation of the device found that it helped seven out of ten individuals experience meaningful amplitude reductions in their tremors, compared to a placebo.
“We see individuals who are able to get back to drinking a glass of water, eating comfortably, and really having their confidence in their own movements restored,” says Elias, CEO of Steadiwear. “When we hear those kinds of reviews, that they’re able to get back to their hobbies, to draw again, it makes everything worthwhile.”
The Steadiwear team is currently working on another update to the device, which would place most components in the forearm, hidden under a shirtsleeve if desired, for a more discreet design.
A smart cane with GPS tracker and fall detection
In 2021, electrical engineer Floyd Lau began developing Victor, a smart cane inspired by his father. Lau’s father had been experiencing declining mobility and a fall left him unable to walk more than 10 minutes without resting.
The cane is full of features. There’s an automatic flashlight that turns on when ambient light is low and motion is detected. “This helps seniors walk at night, such as going to the bathroom in the middle of the night,” Lau says. Fall detection technology notifies caregivers when a fall is detected and AI helps to minimize the occurrence of false alarms. A built-in GPS tracker helps caregivers see the location of the user.
“With GPS location, caregivers can also create a geofence for seniors who suffer from cognitive decline, such as dementia,” says Lau, who developed Victor through his company Amptek Technologies Inc., based in Richmond Hill, Ont. “Caregivers will be notified when the senior is coming close to the edge of the geofence as well as going outside the geofence.”
Victor launched in early 2026. But sadly, Lau’s father passed away in the summer of 2022.
“I wanted him to be the first one to use the cane,” Lau says. “I named the cane Victor in honour of him.”
Socks and leggings that help reduce edema and falls
Lower limb swelling, also known as leg edema, is a condition caused by too much fluid trapped in the body. According to a 2021 study of nearly 20,000 U.S. adults, it affects about 20 per cent of older adults.
Functional electrical stimulation technology – sensors and stimulating electrodes embedded into fabric – can help detect edema and resolve it, too. This technology is being developed at UHN’s KITE Research Institute in Toronto, which is focused on improving the lives of people living with disability, illness and aging.
“The socks can monitor how much edema may be in the legs, then apply either electrical stimulation or compression to reduce edema in the leg,” says Azadeh Yadollahi, a senior scientist at KITE. “You can think of it as compression socks, but instead of having constant pressure all the time, the pressure is dependent on the amount of edema that the person has in the leg.” One of Dr. Yadollahi’s colleagues at KITE is developing functional electrical stimulation leggings that help seniors prevent falls in two ways: detection and training.
“The leggings can detect if the person is going to fall because their centre of mass becomes out of balance,” Dr. Yadollahi explains. Electrodes in the leggings then activate certain muscles to stabilize the person so that they don’t fall.
A weighted vest that improves posture and stability
Shelagh Stoneham started a fitness wearables company, Power WearHouse, in 2021 to make comfortable and stylish weighted vests as an alternative to traditional clunky options. She quickly realized that her weighted vests had the potential to improve the lives of seniors.
Wearing a weighted vest can stimulate muscle engagement and improve bone density and physical performance. Stoneham partnered with researchers at Sheridan College’s Centre for Elder Research in Oakville, Ont., to study how her vests could help seniors feel more stable. The study, released in Health Science Reports in Nov. 2025, found that 73 per cent of participants reported improved posture and stability.
Stoneham explains that the light, distributed resistance provided by the vest subtly lowers a person’s centre of gravity and increases sensory awareness through gentle, compressed contact across the torso. “This feedback prompts automatic postural adjustments, helping individuals stand taller, feel more rooted to the ground and move with greater confidence,” she says.
Feedback from the study shaped future design iterations for the vest, including adding a front zipper with an easy-to-grasp zipper pull. “[It] ensures seniors with reduced hand strength or limited shoulder mobility can put on and take off the vest effortlessly,” Stoneham says.
Also, Power WearHouse weighted vests don’t necessarily look like a fitness product or therapeutic tool, making it more likely that seniors will wear the product and integrate it into their daily lives while on walks or running errands.