Health apps are becoming more popular by the day as the number available soars. MobileHealthNews claims that while there were 2,993 health apps in 2010m by April 2012 they soared to 13,619.
A report from the Pew Internet and American Life Project illustrated the desire of the American public to use mobile technology:
- 42% of 18-29 year olds seek health data
- 39% use it in the 30-49 year old range
- 9% of seniors over 65 use it
Yet have American doctors embraced this technology as eagerly?
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, commonly called Deloitte is one of the biggest professional services firms. Their study, published 5/14 about mobile health tools, asked doctors about their use of mobile health technologies.
Results of their report showed 57% of doctors do not use mobile health technologies. The reason given for this:
- (26%) mobile applications and programs are not suited to their needs
- (29%) concerns about patient privacy
- (44%)their workplace does not provide mobile tools and that they are unwilling to use their personal devices;
The research firm Klas studied the issue of security and found encryption was used by 46% of healthcare organizations to protect patient data on clinician mobile devices and 35% said buy ventolin online europe they used mobile device management software. Twelve percent of surveyed viagra health care organizations say they put limits on the use of mobile devices, 11% said they use an internal ventolin hfa no prescription cloud, 6% said they put limits on mobile operating systems and 5% said they use an external cloud to protect patient data. (Source: KLAS, “Mobile Applications: Can Enterprise Vendors Keep Up?”)
Health Information Texting
Texting for health information by the public at large does not seem as popular. “Only 9% of 2,581 mobile phone users surveyed used text messaging to retrieve health or medical information”. The breakdown showed African Americans,women and those between the ages of 30 and 49 the most likely to receive health information by text.
