[Reblog] Who is making your medical app?

Who is making your medical app?.

Buyer beware!!
iMedicalApps was created for health professionals. The reviewed apps are basically for professional use.
However, there the Forum section (now offline for revision) did at one time include a health science librarian section which I believe included consumer level app reviews/advice.

From the [15 ?] December blog at iMedicalApp

Medical apps are one of the fastest growing sectors in the app market. Medical apps broadly encompass any mobile app that is health related whether targeted to patients, physicians, students, etc. These apps range from providing easy accessibility to previously published texts, health advice, health monitoring for chronic diseases, treatment and dosing guidelines, etc.

 

A new responsibility that arises in the medical app world is management of transparency and conflict of interest issues. Generally, medical professionals are sensitive to concerns of industry involvement in medical education. There are policies in place that manage issues surrounding COI. These include regulating free drug samples, dinners, financial compensation, etc.

However, despite astute awareness when it comes to the aforementioned examples, there remains the question of why there is not more COI sensitivity in the medical app world. Consider for example an app made by a pharmaceutical company – it can suggest its own medicine for a specific disease, or even more subtly, list its drug first.

A recently published book, Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education and Practice(Lo and Field, 2009) lists potential sources of conflict by the pharmaceutical industry. Within medical subspecialties, medical professionals are beginning to notice the importance of authorship disclosure and transparency of the role of the industry (dermatology, psychiatry, to name a couple).

The paper sheds some light on the ethics surrounding increasing transparency for the medical app consumer. The paper points out the need for an increased awareness by all for the need for transparency as more and more of these apps are targeted at non-professional individuals who are potentially more susceptible as they are often not aware of COI issues in this context.

The utility of medical apps is clear–they will provide increasing value in management of patient care as we continue to move to electronically based medicine and medical recording. The need for increased transparency of authorship and industry relations is also clear. Medical apps have been added to the healthcare provider’s armamentarium to provide quality care. Just as we exert caution in avoiding biases with medications, treatments, and medical technologies, we must treat apps we recommend for our patients with the same good conscience.

 

Related articles

• mHealth: Smart apps for smarter care? (childrenscause.wordpress.com)
• Medical apps gain sophistication, draw wider use (billingsgazette.com)
• The Top 3 Problems with Mobile Medical Apps (aclsmed.wordpress.com)
• How to get FDA approval for mobile medical apps (solutionventing.wordpress.com)
• IBM Will Soon Let Developers Run Apps On Watson, Its Smart-As-A-Human Computer (IBM) (businessinsider.com)

 

Five Ways mHealth Can Decrease Hospital Readmissions by David Lee Scher, MD

Five Ways mHealth Can Decrease Hospital Readmissions   by Dr. David Lee Scher

From the column…

Patients who are discharged from the hospital after a heart attack, congestive heart failure, or pneumonia have high rates of short-term readmissions. As per a provision in the Affordable Care Act, a Medicare patient with one of these diagnoses who is readmitted within 30 days for the same will trigger a denial of reimbursement for the subsequent admission.  There are many things which need to change to limit these events, though not all readmissions can be prevented, as nothing in medicine is absolute.  Identification and intensive interventions (inpatient and post-discharge) with high risk patients, better communication/care coordination, discharge processes, and patient education have been shown to produce results.  I would make a case for mHealth to become an integral part of all these components of a multi-faceted solution . here are a few ways that mHealth may be incorporated in the process:

1. The use of bioinformatics to determine the patient’s low, moderate, or high risk of readmission can be put into a hospital app to be shared among members of a multidisciplinary transitional team, which will formulate a discharge and post-discharge plan based on this data, while rounding on the patient daily….

...Click here to read the entire article

Related articles

• A Step on a Scale Helps Keep Heart Patients at Home – Hospital Readmission Rates Plummet Thanks to Innovative Program (prweb.com)
• The Quiet Health-Care Revolution (Atlantic Monthly)

  While legislators talk about “bending the cost curve,” one company serving Medicare patients has discovered how to provide better care at lower cost—with wireless scales, free transportation, regular toenail trimmings, and doctors who put the patient first.

• 5 Reasons Physicians Will Love Mobile Health (engagingthepatient.com)
• mHealth Moving Fast, Raising Hope, And Questions (jflahiff.wordpress.com)
• How hospitals can avoid readmissions (kevinmd.com)
• IMSS: Most hospitals still developing mobile policies (MobileHealth News)
• Physicians in Scotland use iPhone 4 and Skype to remotely manage lung and pleural ultrasound (iMedical Apps, Dec 2011)
• UK patients able to get health advice via free iPhone medical app, review of NHS Direct app (iMedical Apps, Dec 2011)

 

Related Resources

• Get Mobilized! An introduction to mobile resources and tools in health sciences libraries (Medical Library Association)

  Archived 2011 online class including “lecture notes”, resources, class discussions, and related slides/videos

• Health Apps (in Health and Medical News and Resources selected by Janice Flahiff)
  a short list of information and tracking apps derived from the above Get Mobilized class