Another Great Food Diary App To Consider

One thing I love about posting on Smart Phone Health Care is that when I’m researching for my posts, I come across pretty neat apps or ideas. Awhile back, I posted about some great food diary apps. Tonight, I want to talk about the latest one I have come across, called LoseIt! My interest was sparked after I read this article. The author said he lost 11 pounds in 6 weeks using this free app. After looking at the website and the mobile app I downloaded to my , I’m pretty impressed and going to start using it in conjunction with Couch-to-5k.

When registering, you are asked your age, gender, and how much you would like to lose a weight. You have to select between .5 and 2 pounds, and, depending on what you select, a daily calorie allotment is adjusted to your specific needs and gives a projected weight goal date. For someone who likes to see something full circle before I begin something, this is great, even though it’s not guarantee.

The process is simple enough. When logged-in, the home page is your log, and you simply just click on “Add Food” or “Add Exercise”, and assign a food to the correct meal. The food database isn’t too bad, but isn’t nearly as comprehensive as I found MyFitnessPal.com to be. The food section is fairly organized, allowing users to select from not only the database, but a selection of restaurants and supermarkets. I think that would be nice if you couldn’t remember the specific name of a food from a restaurant but could recognize it from a list.

There are quite a few different options on the website. Personal goals can be set (or adjusted). A variety of reports can be generated, such as weekly summaries, BMI, or a “MyPlate Report”. The “MyPlate Report” basically analyzes the food from your daily reports and shows you if it matches up with the recommendations from ChooseMyPlate.gov.

Users are encourage to use the app with friends, as the website claims “that users with 3 or more friends lose 3lbs more than users with no friends on Lose It!” There are also quite a few forums available for support, tips, or just chatting with fellow-users. I liked the “Teams, Contests, and Fun” forum the best, because who doesn’t like a little competition for motivation?

One of the best parts, in my opinion, about this website is the “motivators”. You can set reminders at certain times of the day to remind you to record meals if something hasn’t been recorded by a certain point. This reminds me a little bit of a smoking cessation program that has been created to help people quit smoking by sending motivational reminders throughout the day. I could see these reminders being helpful if a person knows when weak times are.

The app is easy to use but nothing too fancy. It’s simple to see how many calories are left for the day, as well as view a weekly report.

Overall, it seems like another great option for a food diary, but I think for the time being, I will stick with the MyFitnessPal platform. Fortunately, this is a free app that is available both for and iOS.

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July 2, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Android  Apple  Health Care  Healthcare Social Media  iPad  iPhone  mHealth  Mobile Health Care  Social Networking Health
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New Technology Being Designed to Better Diagnose Mental Health Problems by Observing Emotions

Sometimes, when a patient suffering from a mental illness talks with their doctor, they may say that everything is going well, even if it’s not. How does a doctor know if this information is correct or not? Without talking with a family member or close friend, it might be hard. According to mhimss.com, “the premise behind a new wave of startups and entrepreneurs looking to make an impact in healthcare” is mobile technology that will, essentially, be able to analyze emotions through a variety of factors, such as vocal, visual, and psychological cues. The hope is for this analysis of emotions will be administered a long side other vital signs.

The article at mhimss.com said that upwards of 85 percent of people who are “diagnosed with a chronic condition aren’t correctly diagnosed with depression.” And of those that are experiencing depression, less than 1/4 are getting the correct treatment for their condition. This technology that is being developed will hopefully help with this problem.

There have been several companies developing different things. One company, Cogito, is focusing on “vocal clues in phone conversations or visual signals in face-to-face meetings.” Another company, Affdex, are using webcams to read facial expressions. Other systems that will be available will involve mobile sensors that will sense physiological responses to different situations.

While these innovations will hopefully help better diagnose people and monitor their condition, it is important to remember that the technology is not a lie detector or mind reader, said Joshua Feast, CEO of Cogito:

What this technology can do is replicate the observations of an observer. You’re focusing on how people speak and interact, not what people say.

Love this idea. I could see how it could be extremely useful. I mean, if it’s mobile and can monitor someone for a long period of time, that would probably a lot more accurate in determining a person’s mental status than just visiting with them for a few minutes, as some doctors might. I couldn’t believe that so many people are mis-diagnosed and given the wrong treatments for mental illnesses. Having known many people with mental illnesses, I have observed  how people act when they have the correct treatment versus one that might not be quite right. It’s drastic. The companies that are developing these sensors and monitors could help increase the quality of life for patient’s dramatically if the technology actually works. With so many developments coming forth with medical technology, I agree with what Dr. Joseph Kvedar, the founder and director of the Center for Connected Health, said.

It’s the dawn of time for that particular technology. There’s so much sensitivity to the role that mental health plays in our healthcare.

The possibilities are endless. Feast said that he could see it being used to diagnose PTSD and mental disorders, to spotting stress in employers and preventing work-burnout before it begins. I’m very excited to see where this goes in the near future and makes me grateful that we live in a time where so many developments for the bettering of life are being made.

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June 28, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Health Care  Healthcare IT  Medical Devices  mHealth  Mobile Health Care
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WebMD.com Goes Mobile With Well-Developed App

One of my favorite health-related websites is WebMD.com, so of course I had to download the app when it became available. While I was disappointed that the WebMD Baby app isn’t available for Android, there is a WebMD app for both Apple and Android platforms. Here is the description provided on

WebMD for Android helps you with your decision-making and health improvement efforts by providing mobile access 24/7 to mobile-optimized health information and decision-support tools including WebMD’s Symptom Check, Drugs & Treatments, First Aid Information and Local Health Listings. WebMD the App also gives you access to first aid information without having to be connected wirelessly — critical if you don’t have Internet access in the time of need.

For the most part, I really like the app. It is easy to navigate and has a lot of different features. You can sign up for an account with WebMD if you don’t have one, or link an already existing account. Either way, it doesn’t take too long to get into the app.

There are five main sections to the app, which were mentioned in the description above. They can be accessed from the front page of the app, which looks like this:

When selecting the “Symptom Checker” for the first time, I was asked my age, zip code, and gender. I’m not sure if it would ask this if any of the other sections were accessed first. I’m guessing this information is asked just so results can be more customized to your demographic.

I really like the symptoms checker. A digital figure of a body (male or female, depending on what you selected originally) where you select the part of your body that is currently of concern. From there, a list of potential diagnoses come up. Unfortunately, this portion for the app rarely works for me. It says it cannot connect without an Internet connection, even though my phone is connected through the Internet and my data plan. Because of this, I can’t really vouch for the usefulness of this, but if I ever can get it to work, I think it would be kind of neat. As such, I typically select the “list” view, where a list of body parts comes up. It’s nice to be able to scroll through and see different illness and read more about them, including the symptoms. However, as I mentioned in my post about the Internet and hypochondriacs, I have spent far too much time browsing the symptoms. That’s not the apps fault though!

Under the conditions tab, there are a few options. First, My Conditions. Here, you can login to a WebMD account and save conditions you are currently diagnosed with, drugs being used, and first aid information. Then there is the top searches tab, which shows just that — the top searched conditions. And finally, there is an A-Z list of all conditions that have available information on WebMD.

Drugs and treatments has the options as My Conditions does, but there is an additional section called Pill ID. I think this is a pretty neat little feature. You can figure out what type of pill something is (like, maybe you have to take several different pills and you’ve put them into a pill box, only to forget later on which pill is which) by selecting the shape, color, or imprint. There are a lot of different shapes and colors to choose from, and the option is available to type in any letters or numbers on a pill.

The First Aid section gives detailed information on how to treat various things, from asthma attacks to heart attacks to jellyfish stings. These are, of course, only supposed to be used as guidelines, and if there is a true emergency, it says to call 911 immediately. This is a great reference guide though, even if its an emergency, because I believe that its important to try and do something while waiting for medical assistance to arrive. I like this feature a lot.

Finally there is the local health listings. Here, you can search for a physician, pharmacy, or hospital near you. You must have a name or speciality in mind when selecting either of these, but from there, it will bring up a list of names, hospitals, or pharmacies nearby with all the necessary information (phone number, address, map, etc.). Having traveled a good amount in the past few months, and in some cases needed to find a pharmacy in an unfamiliar area, this would have been really helpful to have!

Overall, its a great app. I’d even go as far as saying its a necessary one for everyone to have on their phone. I think it is unfortunate that, beyond the first aid section, an Internet connection is required, but beyond that, I don’t have any complaints!

Download here for Apple devices

Download for Android

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June 27, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Android  Apple  Gadgets  Health Care  Healthcare IT  Healthcare Social Media  iPad  iPhone  mHealth  Mobile Health Care  Smart Phones
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Response to “App Store Becoming a Virtual Pharmacy?” From Happtique’s Ben Chodor

I recently wrote a post about Happtique, which I misidentified as an app creator. Fortunately for me, Ben Ch0dor, commented on the post and provided some more insight into the company, which according to Happtique’s website, “is the first mobile application store for healthcare professionals by healthcare professionals.” I decided to post the comment, so anyone interesting in the idea of “prescribing apps” can get a better idea about what Happtique’s mission is, and what it has to offer.

At Happtique, we love a good debate and welcome comments about our initiatives. We would like to clarify that Happtique is not an app creator. The apps in our catalog are from the Apple App Store — we’ve organized them with an extensive classification system in an effort to make it easier to find relevant health apps. The further assist in identifying quality apps, Happtique is developing a program that will validate the operability, privacy, security, and content of health apps.

For our mRx app prescribing trial, we are working with physicians, physical therapists, and trainers to select apps that are currently in the marketplace (none of which we developed). We agree that app prescribing should not replace pill prescribing. Instead, we see mRx as an enhancement to the continuum of care. It allows physicians to connect their patients with relevant, appropriate mHealth apps. This should improve outcomes, since educated and involved patients are far more likely to follow treatment recommendations, use preventative series, comply with medication regimens, and choose healthier lifestyles.

I appreciate that Chodor took the time to better explain the company. As I mentioned in my previous post, I didn’t think that apps should replace pills, and I’m happy to hear that Happtique hopes that mRx will just become “an enhancement to the continuum of care.”

It is pretty neat that Happtique is creating a catalog of already-existing apps so it easier to find health apps that are relevant to particular conditions. If mRx does become more mainstream in practices around the country (and maybe even world), this would be extremely helpful for healthcare providers, in my opinion. I mean, there are sure to be a bunch of health apps floating around that shouldn’t be prescribed, so if a doctor can just view this catalog and trust that the apps are reputable, it would make the process of mRx prescribing a lot easier. I feel like a lot more doctors would be wanting to prescribe apps if they didn’t have to try and find the reputable ones themselves. Of course, John pointed out that Happtique’s app certification could also go very wrong. We’ll see how it plays out.

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June 20, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Health Care  Healthcare IT  mHealth  Mobile Health Care  Smart Phones  Social Networking Health
Tags:Ben Chodor      mHealth App Certification      mRx  Virtual Pharmacy

Go From Couch Potato to Runner with Couch-to-5K App

I’ll be the first to admit, I’m no runner. When I met my husband, he told me that he wanted to run a 5K that summer (which, I have to admit right now, never happened). Trying to impress him, I told him I wanted to as well. He then suggested a podcast he had heard of called Couch to 5k — because he probably guessed I wasn’t a runner. I found the podcast online somewhere and uploaded it to my mp3 player. I probably used it for about 2 weeks, and then life got in the way for awhile. While I continued to run, I kind of gave up on the podcast. After I got pregnant, I pretty much never ran because I was sick just about the whole 9 months, and since giving birth, haven’t really gotten back into it.

So when my sister suggested that we run together, I mentioned the couch-to-5k series. At first, I started searching for the podcast online, but then I decided to see if there was an app created for it. And lo and behold, there is, for both the iPhone and Android phones. You’ll have to fork out 1.99 (or .99 for the iPhone), but I think it’s worth it.

For those who aren’t familiar with the Couch-to-5k (otherwise called, C25k) program, here’s a little description from the website, written by the creator, Josh Clark:

C25k, is a fantastic program that’s been designed to get just about anyone from the couch to running 5 kilometers or 30 minutes in just 9weeks. With the help of the Couch to 5k program, in less than seven months, I went from a 47 year old, 104kg, 30 cigarettes a day sort of guy to an 82k, 0 cigarettes, running 45 to 40 kilometers a week sort of guy. Ten months after finishg C25k I completed my first marathon. Since then I have run another 5 marathons, as well as 8 ultra marathons including a 100km race. . . Its secret is that it’s a gentle introduction to getting the body moving, starting off alternating between walking and running small distances, and slowly building up until after 8 weeks, you’re ready to run 5 kilometers or 30 minutes non stop.

Although I have never completed the program, I definitely did notice my endurance building during the time I did it. I’m excited to use this new app though and see if it can help motivate me even more. Even though I haven’t had time to use it yet, I figured I’d do a little overview of it.

First off, I love the color schemes. I don’t know why, but the colors of an app really matter to me. The color scheme depends on which “trainer” you select. Here are the three options:

I decided to select Constance for the time being…though if I need a little more tough love, I may select another one. Each of the workouts is led by whichever trainer is selected, and the color scheme changes accordingly as well. Below is the one for Constance. It’s light and easy to look at. The other ones are a bit more intense, but they are still nice.

The above picture is also the front screen of the app. It shows up with whatever date you are on, and you can skip ahead (or go backwards) if needed. Your “trainer” gives a bit of advice or encouragement at the bottom of the screen. The top of the screen features a status bar, to show how far into the program you are.

Once you click on “Go To Workout”, you will be brought to this screen:

At this point, you can choose to listen to music that is already loaded on your phone, or enable GPS. I love the GPS feature, because I always like to see where I ran, and how long I ran for. One thing I wish was included is the background music that was on the original podcast. It just seems like you are told every so often when to change up the pace. It is nice that you can use your own music, but I really enjoyed the pace of the music on the podcast.

Once you press start, this screen pops up with the time left, which stage you are at, distance, and average pace. It’s easy to read, and you can pause the workout if you want to.

There is another tab called “Log” where you can select a smiley (or sad) face depending on how the workout made you feel, plus write down some thoughts from the workout. You then have the option to post to Facebook or Twitter, if that’s your style.

Next, there is a tab with 5k events near you. It lists all the ones that are coming up and some even give you a discount for registering on select races.

Finally, the settings tab lets you adjust certain futures such as the trainer, voice volume and music options.

Overall, I like this app a lot, from the limited exposure to it I’ve had. Once I’ve used it for a few weeks, I’ll be back with my experience, but for now, I’m excited to use it.

Download here for the iPhone (.99)
for Android (1.99)

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June 19, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Android  Apple  Health Care  iPhone  Smart Phones  Social Networking Health
Tags:    Couch-to-5k  Josh Clark      

mHealth App Created to Help Combat Chronic Migraines

An app created to combat migraines was launched May 18th, according to a press release. “Migraine Meter,” developed by Health Union, LLC, has recent migraine news, tips from Migraine.com, and a journal to record when, where, and possible triggers for the migraines. The information can be uploaded to the Migraine Meter’s website and reports can be generated.

When I’m having a migraine, I think the last thing I want to do is to mess around with electronics, however, according to Dr. Susan Hutchinson of the Hoag Neurosciences Institute, keeping track of migraine episodes is very important.

Keep an accurate diary of migraine episodes is an important part of managing migraine diseases, tracking a patient’s history can help me identify potential patterns and migraine triggers to develop a more comprehensive treatment program. I recommend that all my patients keep an accurate journal.

If a journal needs to be kept, as I mentioned in a post about food journals, it is far more convenient to do it on my phone rather than on a piece of paper that is bound to get lost or thrown away. I do get migraines occasionally, so I decided it wouldn’t hurt to download the app. However, I first read some reviews.

I was disheartened to see that people had a variety of issues, from the inability to even register for an account, to screens being glitchy. As I explore the app, I will keep an eye out for these issues to see if they had been resolved. Here is my play-by-play of my first experience with the app:

First off, I noticed there was a lot of lag time between when I typed into the app and when it actually appeared on the phone. I’m not a very patient person, so this was kind of annoying (and kind of gave me a bit of a headache, constantly typing, erasing, and re-typing certain words. Ironic that this happened for a migraine up, right?). When I typed in my username, I couldn’t even see what I was typing, because the screen scrolled down a few inches. Then, it wouldn’t let me enter my birth date. The registering process was overall just really, really slow.

Phew. Now that registering is over . . .

The interface is, well, meh. As in, nothing too special. It is simple, with mainly black and gray colors. The front page has links to articles from Migraine.com. Selecting an article and reading it was simple enough, and I didn’t experience the lag time I first found when registering. There seems to be a lot of articles available, so if news about migraines is your thing, then this app is a goldmine. For everyone else, it’s just a nice resource to have.

Next – the journal. When you click on the tab for journal, it brings up a monthly calendar, with that day’s date highlighted. You simply click on the date you want to edit, select “create”, and enter a variety of details, such as the severity from 1-10, symptoms, triggers, treatment, and notes. Easy enough (well, if you are in a state where you actually want to record it!).

There are just two more tabs left…profile and report.

Profile – not really sure if it is necessary to fill this portion out, however, the app states that “when you visit your doctor, it’s important to share this information in addition to your migraine journal. ” It asks questions such as gender (which, I think the doctor should already know), the year that you experienced your first migraine, family history, current conditions, and other treatments currently used. Typing took forever, and I finally decided that it wasn’t pertinent for me to fill out all the information, so, I didn’t.

Finally, the report tab. Basically, all you do is enter your email address, and a report is sent to you.

And I’m finished. The app was simple and fulfills its purpose. Seeing as the app was just recently released, it’s bound to have a few glitches here and there, so I can forgive it for that, but I think it would be wise to make it just a tad faster .

Until my next review…The app can be downloaded  for Android platforms, and here for the iPhone.

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June 14, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Android  Apple  Gadgets  iPhone  Mobile Health Care  Smart Phones
Tags:Health Union  LLC    mHealth App Reviews  Migraine Apps  Migraine Meter  Migraine Mobile Health Apps  Migraine.com    Susan Hutchinson

Is Meaningful Use Slowing the Growth of mHealth?

mHealth is cool.

There are cool apps, cool gadgets, and a ton of random devices that can do just about anything you can think of, and a few things you would have never thought possible.  There are so many tools out there that could be an asset to people with any number of conditions if only they knew about them, and their hospitals used them.

So why aren’t more people using these amazing devices, and why aren’t hospitals adopting them more rapidly?  If you take a look at EHR/EMR adoption it is not that difficult to see why.

Believe it or not, the very first electronic medical records were created in the 60′s.  Obviously, computers were not widely accessible at the time, so it was not until much later that they became practical on a large-scale, but the point is that the idea existed more than 50 years ago.

Numerous hospitals developed their own versions of digital medical records, but there was really no widespread adoption until meaningful use incentives were offered.  In what is a surprise to no one, doctors in hospitals big and small immediately started to implement EHR/EMRs so that they could get some free money.

Now that is all many doctors are interested in doing to further their practice because they want the money, and also to avoid penalties for not doing so.  There is very little incentive for them to do anything in the area of mHealth so they don’t.

Unfortunately, I think many doctors will never appreciate the value of mHealth until they are forced to do so by the government, or given some large financial incentive.  This lack of implementation by doctors will also directly influence the number of quality offerings from developers.

I realize that doctors are working in an environment where they must be very selective with where they spend their money.  With the rising costs of insurance in all of its many forms, doctors have to do what is best for them and their practice which means that mHealth may just have to be put on the back burner for the time being.

Hopefully, doctors will start to see the value of these technologies all by themselves, but based upon past history I would venture to guess that it will take free money, or the threat of penalties, to make widespread adoption a reality.

What impact, if any, do you think meaningful use is having on mHealth?

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June 11, 2012 I Written By

Filed Under: Gadgets  Health Care  Healthcare IT  Medical Devices  mHealth  Mobile Health Care
Tags:EHR/EMR Adoption  Financial Benefit of mHealth  History of EHR    Meaningful Use and mHealth    mHealth Development  

Pajamas Created to Monitor an Infant’s Vital Stats, Sends Mobile Alerts

Every parent worries, at some point or another, about if their child is breathing, too hot, or too cold while they are sleeping, right? In 2010, Exmovere’s released “Exmobaby” pajamas that measured infants’ temperature and movements through sensors embedded in the pajamas. However, with the announcement that Rogers Communications has combined efforts with Exmovere’s, these “Exmobaby” pajamas are about to have a makeover.

A new feature will be added to the pajamas that transmits information to a parents smartphone, tablet, and a variety of other devices. This is the first “wearable” monitoring system for infants but is added to a growing line of other wearable systems that have been created for adults. Cory Shultz, a iMedicalApps blogger, said:

Rogers sees this as a necessary push in the already saturated mobile data market. By offering a service like this to its customers, it hopes to capture a new market segment that will be dependent on mobile data for continual use.

Since just about everything is going mobile (or so it seems), it makes sense that this Exmovere’s and Rogers Communications are trying to create something to satisfy customer’s needs. If these pajamas really work, it seems like a great product for children who may be ill or have other health problems. The feature that sends information to a mobile app will probably put some parent’s minds at ease when they leave their child with someone else, or when they are in an area of the house that isn’t near the child. I don’t think it is necessary for all parents to rush out and buy this product , but there could be a time and a place for it. Maybe these pajamas could be given to children that may need additional monitoring after leaving the hospital, and a doctor could receive alerts as well if their vital stats fall below satisfactory levels. It would seem that the possibilities are endless.

The wearable sensor market seems to be growing a lot lately, doesn’t it? Exmobaby pajamas appear to be one of the less-complicated ones. What do you think about the growing trend of wearable sensors?

“Rogers sees this as a necessary push in the already saturated mobile data market,” iMedicalApps blogger Cory Shultz says. “By offering a service like this to its customers, it hopes to capture a new market segment that will be dependent on mobile data for continual use.”

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June 7, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Gadgets  Health Care  Healthcare IT  Medical Devices  Patient Home Monitoring  Smart Phones  Tablets
Tags:Baby Monitoring  Cory Shultz  Exmobaby  Exmovere        Rogers Communications  Wearable Sensors  Wearables

App Store Becoming a Virtual Pharmacy?

Recently I was reading about a series of apps that health app creator, Happtique, is currently developing. Basically, the apps would be “prescribed” to patients to aid in their treatment. The catalog of apps available will contain five to 10 different apps. The first ones that will be available focus on heart disease, diabetes, and muscoskeletal disease. Happtique is also considering the prospect of developing fitness and wellness apps.

Doctors who prescribe these apps to patients will be able to monitor if the patient actually downloaded it, but they won’t be able to actually tell if the patient is using it. Those who are interested in using this catalog of apps will be trained “on how to use the apps, how to integrate them into their care plans, how to explain them to patients, and how to prescribe them through the mRx system. Ben Chodor, CEO of Happtique, explained the reasoning behind the creation of these apps:

We want to test whether health professionals, when provided with the prescribing technology and a vetted app catalog, will actually integrate apps into their delivery of health care. Additionally, we want to test whether patients, when provided with an app as part of their health care treatment, prevention and wellness plan, will download the app as prescribed.

Interesting, to say the least. I’m split on how I feel about this, to be honest. As I did a little more research and read another article about the debate over this topic: Can mobile apps achieve what pills can’t? I found that I agreed with what David Shaywitz,  a physician-scientist and management consultant for a biopharmaceutical company, said.

The development of an effective vaccine did a lot more for the treatment of polio than applying the best design thinking to the construction of an iron lung ever could. I worry a bit that in our fascination with technology and design – which matter a lot for patients in the here and now – we’re neglecting the need figure out some way to get at the difficult biologifcal questions that remain at the root of the disease.

Yes, there is a lot of amazing technology out there. And I think in general, people may like to be prescribed to use an app rather than a pill. At first, at least. Then I think the novelty of it will eventually wear off. However, I wonder if these apps will truly do for patients what the correct prescription of medicine can do. Just because an app can be created to help with heart disease, doesn’t been it should be deemed a treatment. Does everything have to be solved with technology? I agree with Shaywitz – valuable time and money that is being used for projects like this could be used to get to the “root of the disease.” Believe me, I would rather be told that the ailment I had recently had been cured, rather than being given an app. But I guess, if you think about it, since Happtique is a company that creates health apps, and if they weren’t creating the “prescription apps”, it’s not like they would be finding the cure for cancer. If it does prove to be helpful, then great! However, I don’t think they should really replace actually medicine, just be a supplemental treatment.

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June 6, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Gadgets  Health Care  Healthcare IT  Medical Devices  Smart Phones
Tags:Ben Chordor  David Shaywitz        Prescribed Apps  Virtual Pharmacy

FDA Mobile Health App Monitoring Could Be Delayed Until 2013

There have been a few posts over the last couple months concerning the FDA potentially monitoring medical apps. Some think it’s a great idea, others, not so much. Well, the latest news has arrived: It is potentially being delayed until 2013.

The reason for the delay? Iowa Senator Tom Harkin recently proposed a bill (S.3187) that, if passed, would require the FDA To provide a  “full-scale report to Congress on its plans for regulating mobile medical apps.” In addition, Senate would have to give its sign off before the FDA could even finalize its mobile apps guidance.

If passed, the FDA would have 18 months to finalize this report, which would take a lot of effort to get it completed.

This has caused a bit of an uproar among different people. Bradley Thompson, an FDA-expert for the Epstein Becker Green law firm said he hopes this doesn’t happen. According to the Fierce Mobile Healthcare article, “he and other proponents are ‘actively talking with Senate Staff’ about the FDA’s timeline, and pushing for the guidance ‘not to be held up.’ With the pace the market is growing and changing, healthcare providers, app developers and other need clarity now on what the FDA expects, and what the regulatory process will be—not in late 2013.”

To me, it seems like if this bill is passed, the mHealth market growth might be hindered. I mean, are the developers of mHealth technology going to want to put a ton of effort into creating different products, when there is a possibility that it may not be in-line with FDA guidelines a year later? I don’t think so. While I am still not sure how I even feel about the FDA monitoring mobile health apps, if it’s going to happen, I’d rather it occur in whatever fashion will be most beneficial for developers. The article I mentioned above says that “it will be interesting to see if it turns into a partisan battle on Capitol Hill.” That it will.

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June 1, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Filed Under: Gadgets  Health Care  Healthcare IT  Medical Devices  mHealth  Mobile Health Care  Smart Phones
Tags:Bill S.3187  Bradley Thompson  Epstein Becker Green    FDA mobile health regulation  FDA Monitoring  Fierce Mobile Healthcare      Senator Tom Harkin


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