health

Water Log is a simple way to track your water consumption from your Windows Phone. While we liked the app, there was room for improvement. Improvements that have been added with latest update.

The version 1.2 update for Water Log includes a log of your daily water consumption, adds the ability to generate a chart to view your progress and resets the water log counter each day. You also get optional sound effects and a few performance issues were addressed with the update. All total, the update makes Water Log a very nice health/fitness app for our Windows Phones.

Windows Phone Central Fitness Month App Roundup: Exercise Apps

February brings about Fitness Month around these parts and there are plenty of Fitness oriented apps available in the Windows Phone Store to help everyone get fit and survive the month. You have apps that help you develop and track your exercise routine, apps that track your calories and apps that help you relax and recharge.

This week's app roundup focuses on the exercise apps for our Windows Phones. Apps that will track our exercise progress, give us a little motivation or simply lay out an exercise routine for you to follow.

We picked five such apps from the various Windows Phone Store "top" categories (top free, top paid, best rated, new+rising). The roundup is but a sampling of what is available. As always, if you have a favorite exercise app that isn't mentioned speak up and throw out your recommendation below in the comments.

An unofficial UK National Health Service (NHS) app has been released for Windows Phone. The app, in collaboration with NHS Choices, pulls down information and services for users to interact with. Integration with Microsoft HealthVault (see our review of the official app) is present should the user wish to connect to their account and retrieve / store personal details, local services and more.

Using NHS Choices, NHS services can be searched by name, location or by how close they are to your current GPS location. Within each service card are details including address, directions (opens Maps), contact numbers and website if available. Patient ratings are displayed, which can prove useful when choosing a nearby practice, especially with regards to waiting times and how patients rate resident doctors. As well as ratings, key indicators are displayed with how many patients recommend that service coupled with survey results.

Health A-Z uses content from NHS Choices to display condition symptoms and treatments within the app. A large number of conditions are listed, accompanied by detailed information, symptoms, diagnosis, causes and treatments for that specific condition. Using the app bar, users can locate NHS services that are able to treat the selected condition and compare them within the app. 

The latest news from NHS Choices is pulled down, and contact details of local NHS services can be pinned to the home screen. As mentioned above, this app connects with Microsoft HealthVault (optional) to securely retrieve and store personal details covering conditions, local services and more. my NHS is a perfect companion for anyone who relies on the NHS in the UK. With information for hospitals, GPs, dentists, opticians, carers and more, the app is up-to-date with information supplied by NHS Choices. Best of all - it's free.

You can download my NHS from the Marketplace for absolutely nothing.

It's Fitness Month here at WPCentral and Mobile Nations, as you all already know, so we thought we'd take a look at some health-related apps for your Windows Phone that can be used to keep on top of those pesky New Year resolutions you may have made for 2012. I've personally been using runtastic for Windows Phone, a fitness tracking app / service that's also available for Blackberry, iOS and Android. So, just how can this app help keep owners fit?