Mobile technology can play a major role in increasing efforts to control chronic diseases and to promote general health and wellness. That dawning awareness is influencing not only public-health programs and caregiver behavior, but also insurance carriers’ business strategies.
When billing and admin IT provider NaviNet acquired Prematics, a supplier of mobile healthcare solutions for providers, in December, John Moore of Chilmark Research posted a long analysisThe same motivation is driving the integration of patient-facing disease-management applications with electronic health records systems. WellDoc said in December that it has If they change patient behavior, such messages – often prompted by alerts and prompts delivered via smartphone or tablet computer applications, during patient visits – could help the bottom line of insurers and, ultimately, help moderate out-of-control healthcare costs. With payers desperate to contain costs, "the office visit still represents a yet unexplored setting," noted Moore."The combination of trust and technology in the exam room represent an opportunity where real-time care messages can make an impact," wrote Moore. "When these messages are relayed through the trusted doctor, they might actually be listened to by the patient." that argued that Prematics’ mobile solutions could reinforce and strengthen the messages around healthy living and chronic-condition management delivered by physicians in the exam room.
The same motivation is driving the integration of patient-facing disease-management applications with electronic health records systems. WellDoc said in December that it has integrated its mobile DiabetesManager app with a “leading electronic health records (EHR) system,” reportedly Allscripts EHR. The integration is part of a study at George Washington University Medical Center, funded by the US Air Force.
“Simply put, integrating the DiabetesManager with an EHR makes the system smarter and better able to deliver personalized behavioral coaching,” WellDoc said in a statement.
Chronic conditions like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, coronary artery disease, diabetes and kidney ailments not only account for much of the mortality every year in modern affluent societies, but they soak up a disproportionate amount of healthcare spending. Coronary heart disease alone account for nearly $300 billion a year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Many physicians’ practices are unable to answer basic questions like how many patients they treat every year and what proportion of those has high blood pressure – much less craft meaningful intervention programs tailored to influence individual patient’s behavior and outcomes. EHRs can be a meaningful tool in such efforts, but adoption of EHRs remains low, as does physician use of them once they’re in place.
Putting EHRs, along with effective and timely alerts and prompts, in the doctor’s hand rather than on her desktop PC could be a huge step forward.
The GWU study will help users and vendors “see how much more effective [DiabetesManager] can be when we really integrate it into physicians’ workflow and make it a part of their daily practice,” WellDoc CEO Ryan Sysko told MobiHealthNews. “Before they would have to access this information via our portal or have it faxed to them, but now physicians have it right at their fingertips.”
Still, whether such technology can have a lasting effect on patient choices is an open question.
"While the NaviNet Prematics acquisition is a reflection of the optimism surrounding mobile technology as a solution," Moore wrote, "I remain skeptical that physicians will dutifully act on these messages, and even if they do, if patients will turnaround their behavior on the basis of an office visit.".
