New devices help mind your health

The FIT monitor from BodyMedia

At this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, health and fitness gadgets shared space in the convention halls with new computers, phones and TVs. Companies like BodyMedia and Striiv are making devices that not only track your heart rate and other health measures, some of them also deliver incentives to skip dessert or go for a walk.

For example, BodyMedia's FIT is an armband that tracks calories burned and other data during your daily activities, whether you're walking up a flight of stairs or doing a full workout at the gym. The collected data can be viewed on a small optional display and downloaded to a personal computer.

And the Striiv system comes with another way to get you and your loved ones off the sofa. You know how organized runs and walks raise money for charity? The Striiv is a personal walkathon built into its $99 pedometer that you can carry on a keychain, belt loop or in your pocket. Walk 18,000 steps and a corporate philanthropist will pay for a day's clean drinking water for a child in Bolivia or preserve a segment of the rain forest in Tanzania.

Get details on other devices, like tyhe Wi-Fi Body Scale from Withings, in my column at MyWell-Being.com.

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Written by Ric Manning

Follow me on Twitter @ricmanning and read my technology columns at My Well Being.