What is mHealth?

According to mhealthshare, mobile healthcare (or mHealth) can be broadly defined as the “delivery of healthcare services via mobile communication devices.” More specifically, “mHealth refers to the delivery, facilitation and communication of health-related information via mobile telecommunication and multimedia technologies – including cell phones, tablet devices, PDAs and wireless infrastructure.”

A recent Research Now survey reports:

• 46% of HCPs say that they will introduce mobile apps to their practice in the next 5 years.
• 86% of HCPs believe that health apps will increase their knowledge of patients’ conditions.
• 96% of users think that health apps help to improve their quality of life.
• 72% of HCPs believe that health apps will encourage patients to take more responsibility for their health.

Here are more interesting mHealth statistics:

• Nine out of ten physicians surveyed say they are interested in mHealth technology.
• 24 % of physicians surveyed report use of mHealth technologies; of these, half use daily.
• 38% of physicians surveyed say that “monitoring patients’ conditions and adherence” is a potential benefit of mHealth.
• 43% of physicians surveyed say that “security and privacy of protected information” is a constraint of mHealth.
• Three out of four physicians surveyed report Electronic Health Records (EHR) increase costs and do not save time, but 60% think they support value-based care.