Why Should Physicians Embrace Mobile Healthcare?
Mobile Health Care Applications Help Improve Adherence Rates
Medication non-adherence is one of the biggest hurdles in treating illness today, with studies showing that for every 100 new prescriptions, only 15-20 percent are refilled as prescribed. Tools and personalized services that can help patients remain compliant with their prescription regimens can be effective in lowering healthcare costs and improving patient care.
For example: with text messaging now the most popular form of communication for mobile users in the U.S., pharmacies are helping their patients remember and order prescription refills by delivering a text message notifying patients when an existing prescription is due for refill, orders can then be completed with a simple “refill” reply.
Patient Satisfaction Increases
Today, when most healthcare systems are adopting electronic medical records, mobile offers patients an environment so they have the freedom to engage when, where, and how they want. Patients can text their doctors while in a cab, make an appointment with a doctor while waiting in line, and even check on the wait time at the closest ER. With mobile healthcare or mHealth, healthcare providers can offer patients convenient access to their personal health information and their physicians.
Mobile health will increase patient engagement
Most patients do not take the responsibility they should for their own health. They may take the approach ‘I feel fine, so if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’. Or maybe they are feeling a bit empty after their physician appointment that they get to see for maybe 15 minutes and only in the time slot permitted? Providers also get frustrated over patients’ non-adherence, or lack of follow-through on basic advice (lose weight, quit smoking, exercise).
mHealth can address all the obstacles mentioned above. It can help with making physician appointments, increase adherence of prescribed regimen, and connect to the patient’s electronic health record portal. All of these conveniences and tools that require patient and/or caregiver input will result in patients’ realization that their outcome is a direct result of the extent of their own participation.
Mobile health technology will improve the doctor-patient relationship
The deterioration of the doctor patient relationship over the past ten years may be attributed to many factors. The Internet is a source of medical information for patients. Most people have at one time performed health-related searches on the Internet. Some physicians react negatively to this. Many patients do not understand the importance of having access to their data or what they could do with it. Only 60% of prescriptions furnished by a new physician will be filled because of mistrust. mHealth will help in improving the doctor-patient relationship by increasing patient participation, improving communication, and providing more accurate data to providers.
Hospitals embrace mobile health apps
Hospitals want patients to feel empowered to request access to their information, take action with their data and work as part of a team with their providers. Mobile is an example of hospital’s expanded efforts to get patients more involved in their health and health care and encourage them to raise the importance of electronic health records (EHRs) with their providers.
Patients are now demanding mobile apps that guide them to the nearest emergency care clinic and texting programs that remind those with chronic conditions to monitor their health. Faced with a dramatic paradigm shift in healthcare delivery, brought on by reform efforts and the resurging power of patients taking charge of their own healthcare, hospitals, often seen as reluctant to enter the technological mainstream, are taking a whole new look at their patients and are now embracing mobile technology.
What a difference a year makes
Few industries have grown as quickly as mobile health has in the past two years. More than half of all phones sold in the US this past year were smartphones and we are “increasingly” using our phones to track and manage our health.
At last year's mHealth Summit, sessions focused on the potential of mobile healthcare to improve access and quality, while participants debated whether or not there was enough evidence to support the hypothesis that it would. Now the focus has shifted to getting doctors and patients to use--and keep using--the apps.
Could 2012 be the year when we see mobile as just another infrastructure option for delivering health to engaged, activated patients?
Learn more in our free mHealth webinar
Join our webinar at the end of this month to learn more about using mobile communications in the healthcare industry.
