india in 10 years: subscriptions, the future of healthcare

In the past few years, the healthcare sector has made significant advancements owing to technology. The miniaturization of medical devices and more powerful wearables will continue to transform both prevention and cure in healthcare. Due to this, we now have access to large amounts of real-time data serving as the foundation for AI (artificial intelligence) and ML (machine learning) to create solutions for the sector.

In the future, the healthcare industry will become smarter to ensure better delivery of care. Predictive analysis will aid doctors with smart algorithms that mine their patient’s data set; complete with previous diagnoses, treatments or genetic information. AI and ML will help doctors diagnose and predict the likelihood of treatment success.

Technology will help support doctors’ decisions but will not replace them—the doctor will always have more context to patients, mainly because of the complex and intuitive nature of patient care that only a doctor can provide. The technology will help doctors in treatment but interpreting the qualitative signals and personalized nuances that patients reveal will always rest with doctors.

Today, people generally go to a doctor or a provider when they are sick; it is more episodic. In the future, we will see healthcare being delivered as a subscription where providers are actively involved in your care and reach out to you for an intervention instead of the other way round. This will be made possible with wearables, as providers will have access to real-time data. Access to patients’ digital health records will also help greatly; analytics will help a provider understand and take decisions faster, even predict if the patient is likely to fall sick and, thus, take measures. Electronic health records will not only map the patient’s medical history but also allow healthcare institutes and doctors to access information without having to sift through piles of paper notes.

Thus, with access to data and analysis, health practitioners can also practise remote monitoring in real time, which means doctors can take the help of technology to diagnose accurately; the information will also be pre-analysed so that doctors can take decisions faster. Maybe there could be alerts set up as well in case there is an immediate need or change in a patient’s condition. If, say, a diabetic’s glucose levels are within a predetermined range, the information is just recorded for future reference. If the glucose levels are problematic, both caregiver and patient will get a message saying, “We need to connect.”

This will also help in better continuum of care, further bridging the gap between the patient and healthcare provider; it will revolutionize patient-doctor relationships. Imagine that your grandmother is a hypertension patient—you open the healthcare app on your smartphone and log in to her digital health record, which shows that according to her cardiologist, she needs to take the prescribed medication to lower her blood pressure and, based on her lab test, she needs to get an ECG check periodically. The software will update you on when your grandmother’s next check-up is due and book an appointment based on your preference. It will also alert you on her medicine intake schedule.

Thus, the way healthcare practitioners deliver care will change as it becomes more personalized, faster and more accurate.

This will also help patients take better care of themselves, for access to data and analysis will enable wearables to predict health problems and offer advice on potential lifestyle changes based on one’s health and genetic history, predict recovery duration, and suggest the right doctor in accordance with the patient’s profile. In the future, algorithms will help to map patient history to the extent that they will be able to predict the future generation’s health/disease patterns, making treatment faster and more effective.

With tremendous scope for innovation, the possibilities for ensuring better healthcare outcomes are enormous. I think we have just scratched the surface of what technology and healthcare can do together…the best is yet to come.

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healthcare in your pocket? the mobile phone phenomenon

The number of studies involving mHealth technology registered with the ISRCTN registry has been increasing in recent years. With this in mind, we thought it would be a good opportunity to investigate this a little further and learn more about this new field of research.

Unless you have been living on Mars for the last few months, you couldn’t possibly have failed to come across the latest smartphone app craze, Pokémon Go. Admittedly I haven’t downloaded it on my own phone (perhaps I’ll use writing this blog as an excuse to do so), but this augmented reality game has become something of a global phenomenon. Amazingly, it’s also been credited with both physical and mental health benefits

Not all mobile phone apps with a health benefit tag capture the public imagination in quite the same way as Pokémon Go of course, but they are certainly big business. According to a recent article in The Economist, there are currently around 165K health-related apps available for either Apple or Android phones and it’s been predicted that the global revenue from these products will reach $21.1 billion in 2018.

Healthcare services by phone, however, don’t have to be high tech. Although many people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) own a mobile phone, far fewer of them own a smartphone compared to people living in high income countries, and simple text messages are increasingly being used as a tool in a number of healthcare-related settings.

As a Database Editor for the ISRCTN registry, I’ve noticed an upsurge in the number of studies being registered that involve the testing of mHealth technology, so I thought this would be a good opportunity to introduce just some of the research happening in this area.

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what ‘mobile’ should mean for healthcare

Ask a set of healthcare professionals about the future and they’ll answer: “Mobile.”

Mobile technology is nearing ubiquity in America; a Pew Research report shows 64 percent of all adult Americans own a smartphone, and ownership rates among millennials reach above 80 percent. It’s clear that to stay relevant and access the next generation of patients, the healthcare industry must innovate its mobile efforts.

But after a number of recent discussions with healthcare executives, I’ve noticed the industry is lacking a clear definition of what “mobile” really means. Continue the conversation with the same set of professionals being asked about the future and you might notice some use “apps” and “mobile” interchangeably. Others use it as a term to refer to anything digital. A few might not be able to define it at all.

So what, specifically, is a mobile healthcare (mHealth) solution? Mobile healthcare

Short definition — Any healthcare service provided via a mobile technology platform.

Full definition — In Connected Sustainable Cities, authors Federico Casalegno and William J. Mitchell introduce readers to Lucia, a fictional 65-year-old diabetic living in the then-future San Francisco, and her futuristic device called a “Passport.” The Passport, described as “the size of a wallet, with a touch screen, GPS, Wi-Fi, and a ubiquitous video connection” was intended to integrate and coordinate a variety of services across the city… but, for Lucia, it is primarily an mHealth device.

While walking to the bus stop, Lucia’s Passport recommends longer routes in order to comply with her doctor’s instructions to walk more. It allows her to check in for a clinic appointment and answer questions posed by her doctor while in route. After an appointment, the Passport reminds Lucia when it’s time to take her medication. The futuristic device is what most mHealth solutions strive to be — a context-aware system that streamlines several aspects of healthcare and helps improve patient compliance.

The Passport may only be a concept, but the mobile devices we have today can be just as effective and efficient when it comes to mHealth. Current mobile platforms include smartphones, smartwatches and mobile tablets. Some potential technologies offer additional forms, like the hands-free Google Glass, but, as yet, have not reached the critical mass required to be deemed mainstream. Any healthcare service that sits on top of those mobiles devices is an mHealth solution.

The designs for those healthcare services are diverse. Some mHealth solutions target future fitness or diet goals with gamified apps, while others deal with administrative aspects of the industry, such as scheduling appointments or refilling prescriptions through text. More yet specialize in helping change patient behavior or treat chronic diseases by providing tools to track symptoms and communicate with medical professionals. While varied, they all fall under mHealth.

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future challenges for digital healthcare

The digital health "revolution" appears to be well under way. According to a recent survey by the American Medical Association, the vast majority of physicians believe that adopting digital health tools will improve their ability to care for their patients.

The American Medical Association (AMA) reported that physicians want new technology to fit into existing systems. Importantly, physicians wanted to be part of the decision-making process when it comes to new technology.

The main requirement of new digital tools - including telemedicine/telehealth, remote monitoring, mobile health (mHealth) apps, and wearables such as activity trackers - was to help physicians with their current practices, rather than radically change what they do and how they do it.

Why are some healthcare professionals becoming disenchanted about the development of digital healthcare and its use in daily clinical practice? Do they view it as being based on little or no evidence?

Enthusiasm curbed as expectations not met

In a recent article in NEJM Catalyst, the authors note that "fewer [digital health] products than expected are being deployed in real-world clinical settings." This may be related to complaints that in practice, these products have failed to deliver on the promise that they will lead to improved quality and outcomes and reduced costs in the management of chronic diseases.

For instance, the uptake of wearable sensors into routine practice for monitoring patients with chronic diseases has been less than anticipated. These devices transmit real-time data to the healthcare provider (HCP) using a patient's smartphone or tablet, and in studies their use has been linked to improvements in a variety of outcomes, from quality of life to improved survival.

Until recently, however, it has been difficult to duplicate these findings in clinical practice, cardiologist and IT researcher Lee R. Goldberg, M.D., of the University of Pennsylvania, told a recent meeting of the American College of Cardiology (ACC). Some studies even reported increased costs (of utilization), no impact at all, or even harm, he added.

Physicians also say they have found that managing the data and incorporating them into clinical practice presents a significant challenge. They are also faced with patients who use their own apps and sensors - many of which are untested or unproven.

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app doctor update: how AI is personalizing healthcare

These days, many people are content to just Google their symptoms and self-diagnose for whatever ails them. This is dangerous, however, as, without the proper medical training and necessary tests, crucial details affecting treatment (like congenital predispositions, allergies, etc) is left out. The implementation of an AI, like ADA, could go a long way to solving this self-diagnosis problem.

Healthcare has always been a field to push towards the development of new technologies and one to adopt them as soon as possible. AI and machine learning technologies bring useful perspectives for health-related diagnosis and data analysis, affecting both the patient and healthcare professionals.

In many places, healthcare is still relying on paper-based data recording that is time-consuming. Leveraging Big Data, processing power, and trained algorithms, an AI-powered system can properly diagnose and treat diseases. In many cases, these systems have the time to analyze patient data and predict disease occurrence before later stages.

AI Poised to Reinvent Public and Individual Health

Healthcare IT News and HIMSS Analytics conducted a survey of 85 CEOs, health professionals, medical information officers and IT experts to gauge the potential of AI in the healthcare landscape.

Among the survey’s chief findings is that population health, clinical decision support, patient diagnosis and precision medicine are, in that order, the top areas where AI is expected to have the greatest impact. Against 4.7% already using AI technologies, over 10% of respondents intend to do so within a year, 23.5% said they would within two years and 24.7% within three to five years.

The survey found that the lack of executive and physician buy-in, data integration and infrastructure constraints are the main barriers standing in the way of AI adoption in healthcare organizations.

ADA, Your Personal AI Healthcare Companion

ADA is an AI-powered app for people who want better control over their health. ADA collects data on the go and stores them after encryption in the cloud. The smart symptom checker allows the user to check the symptoms of any disease via simple, jargon-free and personalized questions. ADA also learns over time and becomes more familiar with the specific conditions and history of the user.

Designed by doctors, the app also serves doctors by a decision support system and assessments based on individual data and history of the patient.

A health companion for patients and assistant for doctors, ADA is already the no. 1 medical app in the App Store in over 120 countries. Within the first week of launch in the US, ADA has been downloaded more than 25,000 times.

Perhaps, when combined with biometric sensing technologies, apps like ADA could take their health-diagnosing power to the next level. What would it take for you to trust your health to an AI?

providing secure messaging to encourage patient communication

Healthcare providers may have a positive impact in how patients utilize secure messaging, according to a recent study published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR).

Provider secure messaging levels can predict their patients’ communicative behavior, researchers explained.

The research team reviewed healthcare and secure messaging records of more than 81,000 US Army soldiers and approximately 3,000 clinicians with access to a patient portal system.

“In this study, we demonstrated that among US Army soldiers, increased provider-initiated and provider-response messaging were associated with statistically-significant increases in the adjusted probability of patient-initiated secure messaging,” researchers wrote. “We also demonstrated that provider-response messaging had a much larger impact on patient messaging than provider-initiated messaging.”

Specifically, patients who had providers that were highly responsive to other patients’ messages initiated 334 percent more secure messages than patients with providers who did not personally respond to other patients’ messages.

“Secure messaging could facilitate the development of deeper relationships by increasing interaction time, making patients more comfortable about asking questions and discussing embarrassing issues, and allowing physicians to provide better advice and education,” the research team stated. “However, such benefits are likely to be realized only if patients and providers are both committed users of the technology.”

The study found that of the 81,645 patients who adopted the portal between January 2011 and November 2014, 7 percent of patients initiated a secure message each month. Healthcare providers initiated on average 0.007 messages per patient per month, and responded on average to 0.09 messages per patient per month.

Furthermore, patients with high initiation-messaging providers were 60 percent more likely to send a secure message than patients with non-initiation-messaging providers.

The research team also found that patients sent 14 percent more messages in a given observed month for every additional primary care visit during the month prior.

Overall, researchers showed that increased provider-initiated and provider-response messaging were associated with statistically-significant increases in the adjusted probability of patient-initiated secure messaging among US Army soldiers.

Even though secure messaging is often part of patient portals, the researchers noted that previous studies have shown portal usage to be low.

To help curb this issue, CMS recently proposed a change to the HITECH Act to reduce the current requirement that 5 percent of patients use secure messaging. Instead, CMS suggested the feature is only required to be there.

However, the research team suggested that reducing the communication recommendation may not be the best approach to encourage secure messaging use.

“The way and degree to which providers generally engage in messaging may represent a marker of the level of approachability that is perceived by their patients during care,” the researchers pointed out. “Provider receptiveness to communication, an otherwise difficult-to-assess factor, might be indicated by the willingness of patients to initiate secure messages with their clinicians.”

Researchers did note that more study into the factors associated with provider secure messaging is necessary “to fully understand the mechanisms of this relationship.”

Secure messaging barriers may also affect how providers and patients are able to communicate with one another.

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most healthcare institutions using non HIPAA-compliant messaging apps

Dive Brief:
A new study from Infinite Convergence Solutions finds just 1 in 4 healthcare institutions that have designated an official mobile messaging platform are using an internal app. The others are directing staff toward regular consumer messaging apps that do not provide the security required to comply the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

The study also finds just 8% of healthcare institutions prohibit the use of consumer apps for employee communication.

The company concludes many healthcare institutions lack the knowledge popular consumer apps do not meet the technical safeguards that HIPAA requires.

Dive Insight:
While much of the issue is around lack of knowledge by healthcare institutions, those grappling with the issue may be pleased to hear employees overwhelmingly say they would embrace a secure solution.

According to the study, 51% of healthcare employees report their institution does not have an official messaging platform, but 92% of them say they would use a company-wide platform if one was implemented, and 64% said it would make communication at their job easier.

"Healthcare institutions need to get serious about meeting their employees’ needs and providing a secure, internal messaging platform that not only allows HIPAA compliance, but also replaces outdated communication systems, like pagers, in order to increase productivity and serve patients faster,” Anurag Lal, CEO of Infinite Convergence Solutions, said in a prepared statement.

The company launched the study in October and surveyed 500 professionals in the finance/banking, healthcare, retail and legal industries.

Among its other findings:
Sixty-five percent of healthcare respondents said they use email the most for business communication, followed by 22% using mobile messaging the most and 13% using voice-calling the most.

As for why more respondents aren't using mobile messaging the most: Thirty-one percent prefer email or phone; 19% say there’s no paper trail; 18% say it’s not as secure as phone or email; 17% say it’s too informal; and 16% say it isn't authorized by their company.

Vectramind Healthcare messaging Platform

Message security is the top concern with mobile messaging for business communication.

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mental health utilizing secure messaging

Calls are no longer considered the norm as texting is now the preferred mode of communication for the younger generation. Nearly all communication and daily tasks are managed through their smart devices, making them more comfortable with the convenience of text messages. Counselors and therapists continue to embrace texting as a way to enable communication with child and adolescent patients.

Although it is not the most traditional form of therapy, teenagers are more accustomed to text messaging. Therapists understand the need to become more accepting of this channel of communication in order to provide better care to their patients. Whether confirming an appointment, checking in, or engaging in brief conversations, more mental and behavioral health providers are adopting text messaging protocols and approaches to foster better relationships with their patients.

Providers are required to take the necessary safeguards to keep communication HIPAA compliant and to keep their patient’s data safe. Most are using encrypted phones, saving contacts with patient identification numbers or by their initials in order to remain compliant and avoid HIPAA violations. Although these are not the safest nor the most convenient options, it is understood that patient data must be secured.

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10 healthcare marketing trends to watch in 2017

The nation’s healthcare delivery system continues to evolve. A curious thing about trend-watching is not that trends suddenly appear. Sometimes that’s true, but not always. In fact, marketing professionals are aware of the healthcare marketing trends on our list.

What is important–the significant dynamic at work here–is change. It is the degree of change that marks a meaningful trend. It becomes something worth watching, evaluating and bringing into your thinking and your planning.

A backdrop of near-constant change in healthcare brings challenges and opportunities. Doctors, hospital executives and marketing professionals have the option of “going along,” or they can proactively manage the course and direction of change.

A Periscope on 2017: Healthcare Marketing Trends
As you look ahead and make your healthcare marketing plans, here are some of the significant trends to consider for 2017:

1)Social messaging apps are becoming marketing platforms. Facebook, Twitter and the other big-names are still popular social hangouts. But what’s growing in popular use are the social messaging apps, such as Snapchat, Messager, WhatsApp and others. As they have in China and elsewhere, these convenient apps are fast evolving to multi-purpose platforms. Real-time customer conversations and relationships are the traditional roots of messaging. Expect new advertising and marketing possibilities to emerge as chat apps continue to grow.

2)Smarter content wins patients.The significant trend is presenting content that is authoritative, interesting and share-worthy. The Internet is healthcare marketing’s front door. Patients—now responsible for an expanded share of medical costs—search online for valuable and relevant information. Amid increased competition for the reader’s attention, today’s content must be fresh, social-sharable and reliable to earn respect and build trust.

3)Personalize; individualize. Marketing delivery systems are more sophisticated. The public/audience has also become resistant to old-style, broad brush advertising methods. Contemporary marketing methods identify user interests and deliver timely, personalized and relevant content on a one-to-one basis. Retargeting, for example, displays ads to individuals who indicate an interest in your website or content. As digital marketing automation creates a user profile, relevant, and personalized messaging is more attention getting and generates greater interest and response.

4)Optimize for mobile, the new universal standard. In the US, four out of five Americans own and use a smartphone. Laptops, desktops and tablets are still commonplace. But an individual will likely connect first using a smartphone. The ability to send and receive email, make Internet connections and do immediate online research is ever present. Healthcare marketing needs to think of the mobile screen first, and budget for and adapt that message to other options.

5)Location-based marketing. Ubiquitous smartphones present marketers with the ability to target and reach a patient/audience by their location as well as by niche. For example, in one strategy uses the device’s location to alert the audience about nearby facilities. Further, location-based marketing can detect and adapt to the social and personal preferences of the audience.

6) Live video speaks louder than text. Internet technology now supports online video delivery, with far more available options than YouTube. What’s more, video has a stronger audience appeal (about four to one) than text. Contemporary healthcare marketing can share stories by way of video content and live streaming video on websites, blogs and by way of social media platforms. The advantages include timeliness, immediacy and educational impact. Marketing plans and budgets are shifting and increasing in video categories.

7)Programmatic video buying is more cost-effective. Sophisticated software can draw on real-time data and produce greater effectiveness from a media budget. Programmatic media buying purchases digital video advertising and presents video ads to precisely qualified customers at the exactly the right time. Within the next two years programmatic video will account for the majority of digital video spending.

8) Monetizing telemedicine. Telemedicine advancements are due mainly to technology and consumer expectations. But telemedicine services are experiencing a breakthrough as medical practices become aware of the ways and means to charge for these services. Medical practices are beginning to recognize consumer demand for text, email, and similar connectivity conveniences. What’s more, monetized telemedicine options—such as online doctor-patient consultations—contribute to office efficiency, profitability and brand differentiation.

9)Patients as informed consumer/buyers. The marketing battle for new patients is played out long before the first appointment phone call. Patients research medical and health information, treatment options, provider selection criteria and dozens of other considerations. Today’s patient has a great deal more “skin in the game” than previously, and their research guides their decisions about treatment as well as their selection of provider and/or hospital. Today’s informed consumer/patient is willing to post physician ratings online, and to make (or withhold) provider recommendations.

10)Patient’s time is just as valuable as a doctor’s time. In a patient-centric world, convenience is the new competitive currency. Patients want convenient and prompt appointment times. There is no patience for waiting days or weeks for an appointment. And little understanding about having to “wait in the waiting room.” Change has driven a new consumer reality. Patients expect and demand a retail-consumer experience.

The high-altitude point of view…

The broader trend picture here is that healthcare marketing is about the one-to-one conversation between the health care provider and the individual prospective patient. Enabled by technology, marketing and advertising continue to shrink from one-to-many to an increasingly precise one-to-one.

Patients/consumers can be reached in a defined geographic location addressed by their personal smartphone. It’s about the ability to deliver exactly the right message at exactly the right time to the specific individual in need. And today, more than in the past, marketing is about a dialog, a conversation, and a relationship.

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mobile phones improve outcomes for hiv-positive people across the globe

The use of mobile technology shows great promise for those who are HIV-positive, especially among those who have limited resources and those in poor areas of the world, according to a new paper published by researchers at the University at Albany. Known as mobile health interventions (mHealth), such tools include dosing reminders, data about medication intake and questions about care communicated electronically, all of which result in better feedback and improved communication between patients and their care providers. These technologies have already proven to be effective for other patients with chronic conditions such as diabetes, asthma, tuberculosis and malaria, according to UAlbany Assistant Professor of Communication Archana Krishnan.

"The near-ubiquitous access to mobile technology has encouraged entrepreneurs, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), researchers and governments to develop secure methods for data collection that include secure servers, data encryption and HIPAA-compliant security protocols," said Krishnan.

The excitement around mHealth initiatives stems from mobile technology's ability to address perennial barriers to health care access like cost, infrastructure and accessibility. "The global health community has now created and implemented a myriad of mHealth solutions in response to problems that previously seemed intractable," said Krishnan. "But, there is still a good deal of evaluation that needs to be completed."

The paper, "A Multipronged Evidence-Based Approach to Implement mHealth for Underserved HIV-infected Populations," published in Mobile Media & Communication, incorporates real-world projects and previous previously completed research on mobile technologies and healthcare.

The study showed that text messages were especially effective in reminding participants to keep medical appointments and that participants found them useful and easy.

Medical professionals ascertained that participants attended their HIV medical appointments, an indicator of successful long-term care retention. In addition to the reminders, the cell phones enabled participants to contact providers with health-related concerns and questions, thereby establishing bidirectional communication.

While the physical geographic location of these studies ranges from South East Asia to Latin America and the United States, the technological context for these studies is remarkably similar, said Krishnan. She noted that the simple use of text messages has been most successful with HIV patients in underserved areas, especially in regions like Africa, India and South America where individuals have limited resources.

Despite the promising trends, however, there are populations where mobile technologies have not been tenable, including sex workers, those with substance abuse disorders, injection drug users, prisoners, and those who are homeless or suffer from mental illness and neurocognitive impairment.

Krishnan authored the paper with Claire Cravero, an mHealth technical consultant and a graduate student at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The study recommends a three-pronged approach to improving care:

Assess accessibility of communication technology tools – mobile phones and computers – and the feasibility and acceptability of mHealth interventions through descriptive studies.

Conduct case studies, usability tests and pilot projects that implement mHealth-based protocols and interventions.

Integrate mHealth tools into existing large-scale clinical, pharmacological or socio-behavioral randomized control trials.

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mobile security strategies for common healthcare providers

With more providers implementing mobile options, overcoming common mobile security concerns is critical for organizations to stay innovative.

As covered entities and business associates continue to adopt mobile security strategies, it can be increasingly difficult to find tools that are innovative but do not compromise security.

Mobile app privacy and security worries and maintaining HIPAA compliance are often top concerns for healthcare organizations in terms of overall mobile security.

Even if a covered entity has a mobile device management (MDM) solution, it just takes one staff member to download an unsecured app to potentially compromise patient data.

Or, an organization may start using an app that is not in fact HIPAA compliant. Sensitive data could become exposed, and may even lead to the entity facing an OCR HIPAA settlement for potential violations.

By reviewing common concerns and what federal tools have been put in place to help providers overcome them, covered entities and business associates can work toward implementing strong and current mobile security strategies.

Understanding mobile app security concerns
Healthcare application security is one of the top pain points for covered entities that are looking to implement mobile options. Organizations want physicians and staff members to utilize smart phones and tablets, but also want to ensure that ePHI and patient data remain secure.

A study released in early 2017 found that more than one-quarter of IT decision makers were not fully confident in their organization’s MDM solution.

The survey was released by Jamf and conducted by Vanson Bourne, with researchers interviewing 550 global healthcare IT decision makers within organizations of all sizes in the US, UK, France, Germany, and Australia.

Eighty-four percent of respondents concurred that their organization is HIPAA compliant, however approximately half said they are not very confident in their organization’s ability to quickly adapt to changing regulations.

Furthermore, 83 percent of those surveyed admitted that security as their top concern with mobile devices for employees, while 77 percent listed data privacy as a key worry. Forty-nine percent stated that inappropriate employee use of devices was their top concern.

Similarly, a Substitutable Medical Applications, Reusable Technology (SMART) Health IT study from February 2017 found that privacy and security with third-party healthcare apps was a key provider concern.

Vectramind Healthcare messaging solutions

KLAS interviewed clinical leadership at larger healthcare organizations about how they currently use apps, what they would like to see in the future, and what concerns they have with healthcare apps.

Approximately half of the respondents said that healthcare app privacy and security was a key worry, followed by app credibility and the ongoing app maintenance.

“For years, healthcare providers have been adopting increasingly integrated healthcare IT (HIT) suites from a single vendor, but healthcare apps buck this trend, with many organizations looking to third-party vendors to supply niche solutions to improve organizational efficiency and patient care,” the report’s authors wrote. “The recent passage of the 21st Century Cures Act, which states that a year from now open APIs will be necessary for EHR system certification, is expected to drive further growth in the app ecosystem.”

Healthcare organizations must ensure that they are using apps that already have necessary privacy and security measures built in. Staff members at all levels need to be properly trained, and should not download apps that have not been cleared by an entity’s IT or security department. Maintaining HIPAA compliance with mobile apps, devices HIPAA compliance is another top pain point for healthcare organizations that are trying to implement mobile devices. Convenience and usability are key for daily operations, but that ease of use cannot be traded over data security. The right balance must be found.

The ONC released an online tool and guidelines to help clarify potential legal concerns and ease provider worry over mobile app security.

ONC collaborated with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and OCR to create the tool, and said that mobile apps must be created in a secure way.

“This interactive tool helps guide developers through a short assessment of their app with a series of questions about the nature of the app, including its function, the data it collects, and the services it provides to its users,” wrote ONC Chief Privacy Officer Lucia Savage, J.D. and ONC Senior Health Information Privacy Program Analyst Helen Caton-Peters, MSN, RN.

Mobile app developers must understand how HIPAA regulations would potentially apply to mobile applications, as well as how any apps would be affected by the FTC Act, the FTC’s Health Breach Notification Rule, and the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act (FD&C Act).

ONC also published a report that discussed companies that offer wearables, mobile health apps, and websites that publish health data.

Sidley Austin LLP Partner Anna Spencer explained in an earlier interview with HealthITSecurity.com that the report explained that when health technology is used by a covered entity, such as a healthcare provider, and that technology collects, stores, or uses individually identifiable health information, the health information on the device is protected by the HIPAA rules.

“Thus, in health technology used by individuals to manage their own health, but not offered or provided to the individual by a HIPAA covered entity or business associate, is outside of HIPAA's scope,” Spencer said.

Foley Hoag attorney Jeremy Meisinger added that healthcare organizations must determine exactly whether HIPAA applies to the type of information that a device is gathering.

“There can be a potential for just whenever there is something vaguely health related, there’s this assumption that it creates something like a health record, to which HIPAA is applicable,” Meisinger stated. “Any company developing some type of technology like that, or is developing an app that works in tandem with something like that, wants to be really clear with what is being gathered.”

Whether a healthcare provider is utilizing wearables or smart phones, understanding how the devices use and store sensitive data is critical. Understanding how state and federal laws will apply to mobile devices will also ensure that organizations remain compliant.

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global mhealth (mobile healthcare) ecosystem market 2017

Global mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem Market 2017, presents a professional and in-depth study on the current state of the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market globally, providing basic overview of mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market including definitions, classifications, applications and industry chain structure, mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem Market report provides development policies and plans are discussed as well as manufacturing processes and cost structures. mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market size, share and end users are analyzed as well as segment markets by types, applications and companies.

Global mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem Industry 2017 is a comprehensive, professional report delivering market research data that is relevant for new market entrants or established players. Key strategies of the companies operating in the market and their impact analysis have been included in the report. Furthermore, a business overview, revenue share, and SWOT analysis of the leading players in the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market is available in the report.

Combining the data integration and analysis capabilities with the relevant findings, the report has predicted strong future growth of the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market in all its geographical and product segments. In addition to this, several significant variables that will shape the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem industry and regression models to determine the future direction of the market have been employed to create the report.

The report begins with a market overview and moves on to cover the growth prospects of the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market. The current environment of the global mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem industry and the key trends shaping the market are presented in the report. Insightful predictions for the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market for the coming few years have also been included in the report. These predictions feature important inputs from leading industry experts and take into account every statistical detail regarding the mHealth (Mobile Healthcare) Ecosystem market.

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how physicians can send secure messaging to caregivers and patients

Secure Physician messaging offers physicians and patients, a secure messaging platform to collaborate with each other. messaging communications to patients and caregivers ensures patients stay in touch with their Physicians and healthcare providers and also helps doctors consult with other doctors and specialty departments via mobile .

Physicians and doctors can can send secure messages with attachments, to fellow practice members to discuss a patient's problem. The messages are sent over private secure network to maintain confidentiality of patient data. Also, the messages are tagged to the patient and can be viewed in the patient's dashboard at ease.When the patient is being consulted, providers can send secure messages to nurses/therapists using the secure messaging framework, so that they can initiate preparatory works, if a patient needs a intravenous injection or therapies after the consultation. This greatly improves the practice workflow and the patients can be treated at a quicker pace and also reduces cost on paper based communication.

 Vectramind's secure messaging framework can be integrated to Hospital EMR and its patient portal, thus allowing messaging correspondence to be initiated by either the patient or the provider. Patients can communicate with the providers on questions about their medications, prescriptions, refill requests, etc. When the physicians share pre-appointment questionnaire to the patient, they get notified to the patient through their PHR. When the patient fills the questionnaire, providers get notified back through the secure messaging framework. Vectramind's healthcare secure messaging also allows providers to configure the number of messages that can be sent by their patients between visits and the size of the messages.

Vectramind has recently tied up with  CERNER  which is the  worlds biggest healthcare solution provider for mHealth solution including SMS, OTT Messaging services, Near Field Communications and Secure Encrypted Messaging.

solutions for engaging hard-to-reach populations

Designing a mobile strategy to engage, activate high-risk populations
Healthcare organizations often struggle to adequately engage and address the health needs of high-risk populations such as Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries.

Yet they don’t need to look far for the technology necessary to address this shortcoming. The solution is already in the palms of their consumers’ hands ­– in the form of mobile phones.

Mobile messaging is one of the most high-impact, low-cost methods of communication. With mobile phone ownership rates high across all major demographics, mobile messaging has bridged socioeconomic and generational gaps. Eighty-six percent of low income individuals and 78% of seniors own a mobile phone, according to data from Pew Research Center. What’s more, nearly 80% of Medicaid members text, as reported by Mobile Marketer.

With such high levels of adoption, strategic mobile messaging programs are uniquely poised to activate and engage vulnerable populations. While many healthcare organizations are already reaching out to patients via mobile message to offer appointment reminders and prescription notifications, the true value of mobile messaging lies in its ability to foster a meaningful, two-way dialogue between consumers and organizations tasked with delivering quality care.

Proven Benefits of Interactive Messaging
New results from a study conducted using tailored text message outreach to 17,000 Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP) Medicaid members illustrates the benefits of an analytics-driven mobile messaging program. The study revealed that interactive text messages are highly successful at deepening member engagement, improving awareness of plan offerings and driving increased self-activation, encouraging members to take a hands-on approach to their care. As evidence suggests, those with the skills, ability and willingness to manage their own health tend to have better health outcomes, generating lower healthcare costs overall.

The tailored messages were found to be significantly more effective in increasing knowledge and changing member behavior than one-way texts. In the IEHP study, analytics-based, interactive texts were found to:

Increase awareness of appropriate settings for care: The number of members reporting they would visit the emergency department for a minor condition dropped from 11% to 4% by the end of the three-month study.

Improve response rates: IEHP’s interactive messages had a response rate of 8.2% compared to a mere 1.1% response rate for standard, one-way text messages.

Encourage member activation: 10% of study participants engaged in a series of health challenges. Of those members who opted-in, 33% reported completing the challenges.

The findings show that members were significantly more knowledgeable about the services available to them and how to best use these services. With Medicaid members visiting the ED at twice the rate of those carrying private insurance, this increase in awareness and activation illustrates significant potential to help members seek the right level of care at the right time and place, driving the overall cost of care down.

Putting It into Practice

So, how can healthcare organizations take advantage of these learnings?

To start, it’s helpful to identify a few challenges your organization wants to address, such as medication adherence, gaps in care, or new member navigation. From there, tailored message workflows can be developed to align with these priorities. In the study, IEHP first identified several specific areas where it wanted to increase member knowledge and activation. Message workflows were then developed to support these key priorities, with a focus on the following areas: choosing a doctor, using the nurse advice line, scheduling routine care, finding an urgent care clinic, operating the community resource center, and offering health tips and challenges.

IEHP accomplished this by leveraging a variety of message types, including:

Informational messages – such as “Call IEHP at 888-123-4567 if you need health advice and want to talk to a nurse.” Open-ended questions – such as “Imagine that you wake up in the middle of the night with a sore throat. How would you use IEHP to get care? Please reply in your own words. Thanks!”

On-demand resources and challenges – such as “If you need urgent care, text URGENT for information about a nearby IEHP urgent care clinic” or “For new ways to take care of your health, text TRY and we’ll send you health tips and challenges.”

Interactive polls – such as “See your doctor for your annual physician exam and routine care. His or her phone number is on your IEHP card. Do you know who your doctor is? Reply YES or NO.”

These messages offered members the opportunity to answer in an open-ended fashion, using natural language processing (NLP) to interpret and analyze responses, allowing IEHP to engage with members by establishing a two-way dialogue. The results were overwhelmingly positive, with 91% of IEHP members reporting that the mobile messages had improved their overall knowledge of IEHP services by the end of the study period.

Implementing an interactive mobile messaging strategy creates significant opportunities for healthcare organizations of all sizes to improve population health while simultaneously improving care quality, resulting in a reduction of overall healthcare spending and improved health outcomes.

Organizations that aren’t taking advantage of this highly effective means of communicating with their audiences will be left behind as the industry moves to embrace consumerism and value-based care, placing a greater emphasis on engaging patients in their health.

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healthcare application management growth seeks containers

Healthcare application management becomes more critical as more apps are built and deployed.

Healthcare application management solutions become more necessary as organizations build and adopt more custom applications as part of their health IT infrastructure.

Organizations across all major industries are developing individual apps to address specific internal and external functions, according to a recent Grand View Research report. Many choose to develop different app sets for each job within the organization, making managing these apps essential to the entity’s success.

App management solutions are essential to operations and to support app maintenance, optimization, support, and migration.

“As the technological adoption gains velocity in the industry, delivery models and service scopes are set to exhibit a dramatic change with software-as-a-service and cloud deployments playing a significant role in the market,” report authors stated.

Healthcare application management is a large part of mobility management strategies and also allow clinicians to treat patients more quickly by making the applications they need readily available on their preferred devices. Application management solutions also ensure that all apps are functioning properly and providing users with the correct information.

Healthcare application management solutions can help healthcare applications remain HIPAA-compliant through their entire lifecycle. App management solutions alert IT administrators to unusual activity by monitoring app operations and security protocols.

Security has always been a top healthcare mobile security concern, and with the number of healthcare mobile apps organizations are deploying rising rapidly, management solutions are more important than ever to ensure data is being accessed correctly and securely.

Healthcare organizations are beginning to embrace bolder strategies when it comes to application management. Containers-as-a-service (CaaS) are being used more often to manage containers and healthcare applications.

A recent Research and Markets report estimates that the CaaS market will grow at a CAGR of 34 percent through 2023.

The transition to hybrid cloud, faster and more flexible deployment, and cost savings are the main driving factors for CaaS adoption across all major industries, according to report authors. Increased adoption over the next five years will drive vendors to develop better and more effective tools.

Healthcare organizations are gaining interest in containers as more mobile apps are being built and deployed for workflow operations and mobile initiatives. Containers are more secure by design than several other mobile deployment options, which makes them appealing for HIPAA compliance and protecting patient information.

Containers provide naturally increased security by separating data. Containers access PHI by clearance level or department protects data in other containers. While the data in the breached container is still compromised, the other containers are virtually separated and unaware of each other, making cross-penetration impossible.

Organizations are using containers more often to build, deploy, and manage apps. Containers also enable digital transformation because they increase IT infrastructure density.

Container management solutions are constantly being developed. Earlier this week, Skytap announced the release of Skytap Container Management, which will allow organizations to develop, deploy, and run traditional enterprise and containerized applications together in the Skytap cloud.

Skytap developed its application management tool to accelerate application modernization in the wake of rapid IT infrastructure digitization.

“This transformation requires enterprises to evolve IT infrastructure, processes, and architecture,” Skytap said in a statement. “Organizations in every industry need to replace legacy hardware with cloud resources, implement agile and DevOps processes, and adopt new application architectures, including containers. Executing this transition enables faster, safer, and more efficient software delivery, which is the cornerstone of on-demand digital services that customers expect.”

Skytap’s solution takes enterprise applications that are locked in the datacenter and moves them to containers in the cloud.

Organizations need healthcare application management solutions that are not only secure, but also flexible enough to adapt to future app development initiatives.

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effective patient messaging drives better healthcare service

Medication non-adherence is a growing issue for patients, physicians and health plans. A recent report by the United States Government Accountability Office indicated that in each fiscal year from 2009 through 2011, the most expensive 5% of Medicaid-only enrollees accounted for almost half of the expenditures for all Medicaid-only enrollees. In contrast, the least expensive 50% of Medicaid-only enrollees accounted for less than 8% of the expenditures for enrollees.

Patient nonadherence to prescribed medications is associated with poor therapeutic outcomes, progression of disease, and an estimated burden of billions per year in avoidable direct healthcare costs.

Beyond medication non-adherence for Medicaid enrollees, the total costs to the U.S. healthcare system for non-compliance include a direct cost estimated at $100 billion to $289 billion annually and costs of $2000 per patient in physician visits annually, according to the CDC.

It’s clear that medication adherence needs to be a key area of focus for plans and providers hoping to provide higher-value care. Here’s how offering messaging to patients through their preferred channels of communications can help.

Finding what works
For health plans and providers, understanding the what, when and how of personalized messaging delivery is critical to more compelling engagement with patients.

As indicated in a study noted by the American Heart Association, the potential of text messaging and other mobile-phone based methods (mobile health or mHealth) to engage patients has been met with great enthusiasm because of the relatively low cost, transportability, and widespread use of mobile technologies.

Creating a personalized healthcare messaging program for patients via text messaging, email, portals and other outreach programs should begin with determining and accommodating the patient’s preferred method of communication.

This can be determined through programs that request a response from patients regarding their preferences.

Health plans and providers should consider content for messaging that reflects the language preference of the member, healthcare savings topics that are determined using the patients’ current benefits, and health improvement tips that offer social network site support that are of value to the patient.

Creating a coupon offer for a free screening at a healthcare services location that is close to the patient suggests to the patient that the health plan or provider understands the patient’s interest in convenience, while delivering medication reminders via mobile messaging can be an impetus to adhere to medication guidelines to help raise adherence and lower costs associated with non-compliance.

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how healthcare apps are revolutionizing patient outcomes

Increased patient involvement, greater patient awareness of health issues, and heightened motivation for patients to lead healthier lifestyles; all this and more are among the boons of the digital mobile health revolution. Many physicians have learned to take advantage of — and contend with — the plethora of possibilities health-oriented apps and devices have opened up.

Healthcare Apps though are not replacement of doctors or caregivers, however it helps patients to communicate and be in touch with their physicians and healthcare providers .Such apps make it possible for physicians to stay on top of patient behavior in a way that was impossible until now. They also enable patients to keep a constant eye on their own conditions, taking a greater role in ensuring they remain healthy or recover faster from a disease.

 Across Playstore and Apple apps  Store, there are variable swath of free and premium medical apps on the market, some of which allow you to better understand pharmaceuticals while others work to diagnose your symptoms and prep you for an unforeseen medical emergency.

for example there are apps that enable patients to follow up with physicians after treatment. As demonstrated in a recent University of Toronto study, these tools could reduce the need for follow-up visits, lowering costs and ensuring better recovery for patients who often miss those follow-ups because they are feeling better.

Other dangers of health apps include the compromising of patient data (hacking is just as big of a problem for developers of health apps as it is for others), as well as the possibility an app that records inaccurate information could upload that bad data to patients’ EHR, spreading problematic information throughout their care cycle.

Healthcare professionals run some risks when prescribing apps to patients. On the pro side, patients may be more engaged; however, some may also view such an app as a replacement for their doctor. For instance, if an app says patients are doing well, they may decide they can skip an in-person appointment — a decision that could eventually come back to haunt them. Even worse, apps might undermine long-term doctor-patient relationships as patients begin to rely on apps instead of providers for information. Evidence on whether or not this is true is hard to come by.And, of course, there's the bottom line: healthcare facilities could end up losing income if patients begin to replace them with apps.

big data, Iot-driven apps set to reform healthcare

Medical Apps powered by Big Data and Internet of Things can help doctors share best practices as well as treat patients internationally. The Apps generally combine live streaming and instant messaging and networking in a secure environment. Direct and double encrypted conversations among doctors can be achieved through these state-of-the-art Applications. Encryption ensures the privacy of interactions, even as a patient receives the best medical advice and care. Healthcare professionals using the Apps are put through a credentials check before being admitted into the system.

The Apps can be revolutionary: A doctor with Medicines sans Frontieres (MSF) in war-ridden Syria can coordinate and operate together with a surgeon based in California to treat a rocket blast the victim through live streaming. It does sound incredible. This is where medical science and modern technology such as Big Data Analytics and Internet of Things (IoT) are headed for.

Cloud-based Big Data Apps can provide crucial information on the go
Big Data Apps provide access to an interactive educational library featuring training courses, live streams, huge volume of research along with in-house virtual reality, points of view, and augmented reality productions. Such features allow physicians to run through millions and millions of research papers and genetic sequencing data, conduct high-speed analysis, sift through innumerous treatment records globally, delivering insights into treatment of patients with a specific DNA sequence or specific blood group. Medical personnel can benchmark patients with past occurrences, analyzing how patients with particular genes respond to specific treatments, enabling them to make decisions based on facts, not mere judgment.

Organizations like MDLinking are building doctor networks across the world including medical colleges and not-for-profit healthcare institutions like the Aga Khan Development Network, Partners in Health and Doctors Without Borders.

Such mobile phone applications are designed so as to leverage the device’s storage to build usable offline functionality that can be used in case of low Internet connectivity in places like war zones, rural areas, or places struck by disaster. The Apps are different from Web applications in that they don’e need a continuous Internet connection. Offline functionality allows the Apps to connect to Cloud-based applications and retrieve data when internet connectivity is available. For example, online medical articles and journals can be accessed even if there is no Internet connection or when connection is intermittent or periodic.

“Big Data Analytics can provide physicians and doctors the opportunity to dig deep into data and device novel treatments, which may have escaped them before,” said Shashank Dixit, CEO, Deskera, a cloud provider with a Big Data Application.

Bringing high quality healthcare to the Third World and developing countries
Billions around the world, particularly in developing and underdeveloped countries with low incomes, suffer due to absence of proper healthcare. India ranks low on the World Health Organization’s list of global healthcare systems. A huge chunk of Indian population is still outside the ambit of health services. In such cases collective medical knowledge will help in providing health services to the 5 billion people in Asia and Africa with little access to healthcare.

The technology would be especially helpful in such settings as it would remove the resources spent transporting patients from one health institution to another. Medical professionals from across Africa, Asia, Europe, and the USA are signing up for such Apps. The day may not be far when a patient in Kampala will be operated by surgeons spread over California, Sidney, and Cairo.

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healthcare messaging and its impact on elderly patient care

Mobile Healthcare Messaging

Due to the nature of care required for elderly patients, it has become common for family members to play an integral role in long-term care for patients at home, during the transition between facilities, and even in healthcare decision making. In fact, 65.7 million family members have become caregivers who provide care to someone who has aged, is ill or disabled in the United States.

A recent report from Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice Center (JHUEPC), have shown that a  systematic communication between healthcare providers, patients and their familie results in better patient care for the family members involved.

 Mobile and secure messaging can play a big role in providing long term care to elderly patients and caregivers.The systematic communication between healthcare providers, patients and their families simply results in better patient care and better peace of mind for the family members involved. Because text messaging has become a preferred means of communication in both professional and personal environments, healthcare teams and family members often rely on native SMS text to collaborate for faster patient care decisions.

In fact, 95% of healthcare professionals, physicians and nurses use their smartphones and tablets for work – whether sanctioned or not. However, because healthcare data breaches are up 40% from 2015, skilled nursing facilities need to be confident that the sensitive patient information shared within the circle of care will not be compromised.

 As healthcare providers transition from fee-for-service to value-based care, it's becoming more important than ever for healthcare providers to streamline communications with the entire care team, all while maintaining HIPAA compliance.

The  healthcare industry is among  the most targeted industries for cyberattacks, hence its  important to go beyond compliance to truly ensure the integrity of the patient record and protect patient privacy. Therefore, skilled nursing facilities should consider secure messaging platforms that focus first and foremost on the protection of the circle of care communications.

 The caregiver team can also leverage the efficiency and features of SMS texting, such as group text, without opening up the conversation to risks, vulnerabilities or outside sources. Further, secure messaging platforms available today can prevent images from being screenshotted or stored on devices, and provides the ability to expire messages from devices and message servers based on policy while maintaining a copy of the communication with the patient record in the EHR . A recent report projects that the marketplace for technology designed to assist aging adults is expected to reach more than $30 billion in the next few year which is a rise of 1400% from today's market figures.

how local governments can use short code messaging for citizens

According to research conducted by Pew Research on smartphone usage, one of the most overlooked mobile features—yet most frequently used by consumers—is SMS/MMS text messaging. If utilized properly, this can provide a direct and ongoing line of engagement to local residents, which can become extremely important when trying to notify citizens of a major public-safety incident. However, in order to do that, access and approval to message with local mobile numbers is needed. One way some agencies have been accomplishing this is through the use of common short codes. 

These five- to six-digit codes let mobile users opt-in to receiving text-message notifications from a particular agency. They are universally accessible on most networks and mobile devices. Most federal agencies in the US and Canada specially local governments across American cities have already have messaging alert systems that local residents have the option to join an subscribe to alerts . However most of them lack a dedicated mobile service and have a a website, which can limit residents’ awareness of and engagement with these programs.

 In today’s mobile first world, local governments can employ common short codes to increase engagement and get more residents connected and informed. This lets residents easily opt-in to alerts and announcements, and government agencies can promote them via advertisements, brochures and other collateral.Healthcare is another big area which local governments can aid citizens regarding epidemic, health scares or other pandemic . EMERGENCY services too can be enabled across mobile messaging which could keep local communities in staying abreast of government policies and healthcare updates and safety issues.

 Another advantage of utilizing SMS/MMS is that it is targeted to a mobile subscriber’s opt-in phone number, which may or may not physically be located in the geographic area where a person is currently located. For example, subscribers could sign up for weather alerts in the town where they have a home or or on vacation or are where they have family or relatives to monitor their safety. Short code mobile messaging can be used to target an area where the subscriber is currently physically located and where the phone is turned on and is receiving a signal.For example weather updates and local information,like trade shows, seminars, industry conferences can be advertised and promoted via " mobile messaging "

5 trends across healthcare predictive analytics market:

Healthcare Predictive Analytics Market: Overview

A significant rise in the demand in the healthcare predictive market expected to be seen in the forecast period. This can be attributed to the increasing prices of medication facilities and increasing popularity of personalized medicines. Regionally, North America is expected to head the healthcare predictive analytics market.

Healthcare Predictive Analytics Market: Competitive Players
Some of the major companies in the healthcare predictive analytics market include Allscripts, Optum Inc., SAS, Verisk Analytics Inc., MedeAnalytics Inc., IBM, Oracle, McKesson Corporation and Cerner Corporation.Healthcare Predictive Analytics Market: Segmentation

The global healthcare predictive analytics market is segmented into its type, application, component, delivery model, end-user and geography. On the basis of type, the market is divided into predictive analytics, descriptive analytics and prescriptive analytics. Based on application the market is segregated into financial analytics, clinical analytics, population health analytics and operational and administrative analytics. The financial analytics is further classified into claims processing, revenue cycle management, fraud, waste, and abuse (FWA), payment integrity and risk adjustment, the clinical analytics is further divided into comparative analytics/comparative effectiveness, quality improvement and clinical benchmarking, reporting and compliance and clinical decision support and precision health and the operational and administrative analytics is divided into workforce management, supply chain management and strategic analysis. On the basis of component, the market is classified into services, software and hardware. Based on delivery model the market gets divided into on-demand and on-premise model. Based on end-user, the market is segregated into providers, payers and HIEs, ACOs, TPAs and MCOs. Providers include post-acute organization, hospitals, physician practices and IDNs and ambulatory settings and payers include government agencies, private insurance companies and employers and private exchanges. Diversification on the basis of region is seen into North America, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America and Middle East and Africa.

Healthcare Predictive Analytics Market: Competitive Players
Some of the major companies in the healthcare predictive analytics market include Allscripts, Optum Inc., SAS, Verisk Analytics Inc., MedeAnalytics Inc., IBM, Oracle, McKesson Corporation and Cerner Corporation.

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non hipaa-compliant messaging apps by healthcare institutions rise by 92%

92 percent of healthcare institutions are using non HIPAA-compliant messaging apps, according to a study released today by Infinite Convergence Solutions, Inc. What’s more, only 1 in 4 healthcare institutions who have an official mobile messaging platform are using an internal, company-authorized app. The rest are recommending or using consumer-facing messaging apps and services that do not provide the enterprise-grade security needed to comply with regulations, such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

Healthcare Employee Messaging Habits vs. Official Messaging Polices
The study also found that employees in the healthcare industry use mobile messaging more frequently than voice calling for their business communication, where they most frequently communicate with colleagues. The immediacy of the information employees need to communicate matters most when they are deciding whether to use phone, email or mobile messaging to reach someone.

However, 51 percent of healthcare employees say their company does not have an official mobile messaging platform, despite the fact that 92 percent of these employees would use a company-wide mobile messaging platform if their employer decided to implement one. Sixty-four percent said it would make communication at their job easier, as well.

“We are seeing a rapid adoption of mobile messaging in healthcare as the industry looks to work faster, improve patient care and reduce wasteful spending,” said Anurag Lal, CEO of Infinite Convergence Solutions. “The problem is that many healthcare institutions are not aware that the messaging apps and services that are popular for daily personal use do not follow the administrative, physical and technical safeguards that HIPAA requires.”

Of the 49 percent of healthcare employees who say their employer has an official mobile messaging platform, 16 percent say that platform is GChat and 11 percent say it’s WhatsApp. What’s more, even without an official mobile messaging platform, healthcare institutions recommend employees use consumer mobile messaging apps. None of these messaging apps or services typically follow HIPAA guidelines for messaging security.

“We’ve found that 91 percent of healthcare employees use mobile messaging at least a few times per week for business communication,” said Lal. “Healthcare institutions need to get serious about meeting their employees’ needs and providing a secure, internal messaging platform that not only allows HIPAA compliance, but also replaces outdated communication systems, like pagers, in order to increase productivity and serve patients faster.”

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global mhealth (mobile health) market to grow at a cagr of 38.02% by 2020

The mHealth services dominated the market in and are expected to grow over $55.63 billion by the end of the forecast period due to the increasing usage of mHealth solutions by healthcare providers and pharmaceutical companies along with end users (patients). However, device segment is expected to grow in near future with a high CAGR of 38.02%, from 2015 to 2022, due to increasing integration of mHealth devices with smart phones and weareables, and also, increasing opportunities of connected health solutions are predicted to promote the growth of this market through the forecast period.

The detailed study on Mhealth (Mobile Health) market is done by compiling information from primary as well as secondary research points. It comes from journals, databases, white papers and updated press releases. It understands the factors driving the market and what inhibits the development of Mhealth (Mobile Health). There is a systematic compilation of trends and key opportunities of this market with its maximum authenticity. The current size of the market and the anticipated changes have also been discussed in detail.

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This report considers the main regions i.e. North America, Middle East & Africa, Asia Pacific, Europe and Latin America. Top manufacturers in global market, their capacity, production, revenue, price and shares are covered in detail.

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Key segmentations and sub segmentations are elaborated with right information for Mhealth (Mobile Health) market. The popularity and anticipated opportunities for all the segmentations are well explained in order to give a clear idea about the market trends. On the basis of estimations of the key segmentations, Mhealth (Mobile Health) market has been elucidated. Technological developments which have taken place during the ongoing market situation and the predicted scenario during the forecast period are presented systematically.

The future potentials of this market are analyzed and the prevalent trends are been looked upon with utmost detailing. The growth in all the major geographic regions are been studied in detail in this particular report. With exact data on the top most regions for this market and the reason they hold that position is studied and elaborated.

Moving forward, a competitive landscape of Mhealth (Mobile Health) market is presented for understanding the market importance. This section gives the prime strategies, weaknesses and strengths and the major contributed of the growth have been highlighted. Gross, revenues, product overview, contact information and many such points are explained for Mhealth (Mobile Health) market in depth.


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