More on mobile health

This week, Clinical Innovation + Technology brought you much more coverage from the recent mHealth + Telehealth World Congress 2013, which covered exciting developments in this area of healthcare.

But, also this week, came the news that the frequency, severity and impact of data breaches are escalating with the looming threats of organized crime, corporate espionage and cyberterrorism.

ID Experts’ report finds that in the United States, 12.6 million individuals were victims of identity theft in 2012 compared to 5 million in 2003. Moreover, in the past two years, 94 percent of healthcare organizations surveyed suffered at least one data breach and, in 2011, more than two million people were affected by medical identity theft.

Underscoring the financial motivation of the breaches, ID Experts reported that in 2011, a medical record could fetch $50 on the black market.

We also learned this week that about 80,000 veterans took part in more than 200,000 telehealth consultations with physicians and therapists in 2012, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The telehealth program also reduced veterans’ bed days by 58 percent and admissions by 38 percent, according to an article published in Military.com.

Meanwhile, at the conference, Naomi Fried, PhD, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, shared the organization’s efforts to develop apps for the hospital setting. For example, BEAPPER is designed to help emergency department clinicians communicate more effectively and get test results back more quickly, and GPUTT (gastrointestinal procedural unit time tracker) is a digital solution to track patient flow which has proven to be an efficiency enhancer.

Fried said it’s exciting that these mobile apps support strategic initiatives at the hospital level, such as enhancing clinician efficiency and enhancing the family experience.

Joseph Kvedar, MD, director of the Center for Connected Health at Partners Healthcare in Boston, talked about how the addictive nature of smartphones “gives us the opportunity to get you addicted to your health.”

Technology offers a wealth of potential to improve healthcare but all successful implementations are due to the people involved understanding that it’s not about the technology, said Jonathan Shankman, vice president of analytics for AMC Health. “It’s about actual information and getting that information in front of clinical eyes so something can be done with it. Too many people forget about that last piece.”

Is your organization utilizing mobile health to engage patients, improve efficiency or improve outcomes? Please share your experience.

Beth Walsh

Clinical Innovation + Technology editor