My Top 3 mHealth Benefits

By Ken Congdon, editor in chief, Health IT Outcomes

I’ve written a lot about mobile technologies during my tenure at Health IT Outcomes. Some of these articles focus on the clinical and workflow advantages mobile devices bring to healthcare providers (e.g. Healthcare Going Mobile), while others focus on the security, management, and distraction challenges these technologies can create (e.g. iPhones &iPads: A Medical Liability?).

While I’ve made it a point to cover both sides of the mHealth trend, I believe the good significantly outweighs the bad when it comes to the deployment of mobile technologies in healthcare settings. In keeping with our focus on mobility, as demonstrated by our continued newsletter coverage of our special editorial compilation The Mobile Health Revolution (see the article Choose The Right Mobile Cart in this week’s newsletter), here are my top three mHealth benefits:

1. Improved Data Accuracy — Mobile devices such as mobile workstations, notebook computers, and tablet computers allow more and more patient data to be captured electronically at the point of care. Entering data directly into an EHR or other health information systems helps eliminate the data entry errors that often occur when clinical notes are first recorded on paper and entered at a later time into the EHR by nurses or administrative personnel. Mobile devices are also instrumental in increasing the accuracy of medication administration. Handheld computers equipped with EHR software and barcode readers are being leveraged to scan patient wristbands to ensure that the right drug, in the right dose, is being administered to the right patient, at the right time. This closed-loop approach to administering medications helps eliminate the potentially life-threatening adverse drug events that often occur due to medication errors.
2. Improved Data Access— Mobile computers, tablets, and smartphones allow clinicians to not only enter, but also access, critical patient information from any place at any time. Physicians can access critical EHR data at the point of care or at a remote location to make the best treatment decisions based on up-to-the-minute patient data. Lab reports and medical images can even be accessed using these devices and shared with the patient in real-time, improving the patient experience. Mobile computers and smartphones can also provide patients with a means to access their own health information. As proposed in the Stage 2 Meaningful Use requirements, hospitals and healthcare professionals are encouraged to enable patients to view, download, and transmit their health information online. Electronic communication between patient and provider has also been encouraged. Mobile devices will help provide patients with constant access to their personal health data, and provide a means for them to always communicate with their healthcare provide.
3. Improved Patient Care— The ultimate goal of any clinically-focused IT initiative is to improve patient care, and mobile technologies can definitely deliver on that promise. In addition to some of the patient care benefits already mentioned above (e.g. reduced medication administration errors, improved health data access), mobile computers and smartphones can provide physicians with an ever-present clinical decision support tool that ensures they are providing patients with the best treatment plans. For example, a clinical decision support application embedded on a smartphone or tablet can provide physicians with a list of potentially viable diagnoses based on a series of symptoms that a doctor may not have otherwise considered. Similarly, these devices can alert a physician when he or she prescribes a drug that the patient may be allergic to or negatively interact with another drug the patient is already taking.
    

Other types of mobile devices, namely remote monitoring and telehealth devices, allow physicians to keep daily tabs on their chronically ill patients without having to see them in the office. These technologies can allow physicians to monitor vitals like weight, heart rate, blood pressure, and blood glucose levels remotely. They can also provide a means for a physician to physically examine a patient remotely via teleconference. These new treatment options have the potential to forever change the physician patient dynamic for the better by helping to keep patients healthier and out of the hospital.