page sections

Technology

last authored:
last reviewed:

Example Paradigms

http://www.commcarehq.org/home/

Introduction

University of Chicago - internal medicine program (iPads)

Johns Hopkins - internal medicine program (iPads)

Medical schools at Yale and Harvard have paperless, iPad-based curriculums.

"Even without institutional support, clinicians are using mobile devices more. Dr John Halamka estimates there are about 1,000 iPads in use at his hospital (Beth Israel Deconess Medical Center in Boston) every day, none purchased by the medical center." Kate Pickert.

Time Aug 27, 2012

Study in Archives of Internal Medicine: patients got tests and treatments faster if they were cared for by iPad-equipped residents.

return to top

“Several informants raised the concern that many mHealth applications available in practice may not be effective, engaging, usable, or meeting the needs of users. Few applications have been evaluated, and those that have often involve complex interventions where the components or mechanisms have not been examined. Many felt that not a lot is known as yet about what aspects of mHealth work, for whom, and why. Few published health interventions delivered via mobile technologies discuss a theoretical basis or evaluate theoretical components hypothesized to be important in the intervention.

It was stated that there is much hype and lots of players all “doing their own thing.” Some informants felt that some mHealth developers may have a bias toward developing programs for people like themselves using the technologies they like, rather than starting with the problem and working with end users to develop the most useful and usable solution.

Some pointed to statistics in the media showing that many smartphone applications are downloaded but not used. More recently, reviews have found poor quality in terms of accuracy, usability, consistency with national practice guidelines, and effective practices” (Whittaker, 2012).