Mobile Health Apps Not Reliable for Managing Chronic Patients

There was a wide range of highly rated apps that offer to help people with conditions such as diabetes and depression.

Depending on smartphone-based health applications for managing chronic conditions or complex health needs may prove to be risky as such apps are falling short on many counts, finds a study led by Indian-origin scientist.

"Clearly, there is a large-scale proliferation of apps happening related to health and people have made the switch-over to smartphones. But the question is, to what extent are apps serving the needs of patients with chronic diseases and their caregivers, as opposed to generally healthy people seeking help with wellness," said lead author Karandeep Singh, Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan in the US.

Lack of Behavior-change Techniques in Mobile Health Apps
For top rated physical activity apps, behavior-change techniques are not very well represented in marketing materials, a team of researchers have found.

‘There was a wide range of highly rated apps that offer to help people with conditions such as diabetes and depression, but for those with arthritis or pain only few options high-quality apps were present.’

The study is based on a comprehensive review of 137 of the most highly rated or often recommended mobile health or mHealth apps on Apple and Google app stores, aimed at people with chronic conditions.

The findings showed that there was a wide range of highly rated apps that offer to help people with conditions such as diabetes and depression, but for those with arthritis or pain only few options high-quality apps were present."

The ratings on app stores mainly supplied by other users could not always be a reliable guide even with highly rated apps. Further, nearly 121 of the apps were found to let people enter information such as a daily blood sugar or blood pressure level or whether they were feeling suicidal into their phone.

Time to Put a Check on Mobile Health Apps
A team of scientists have called for objective review and certification process of mobile heath Apps, in view of the rising abundance of mobile health apps, that are not regulated by the government.

However, only 28 of these apps reacted appropriately when the reviewers entered a dangerous value, for instance a high blood pressure or low blood sugar level, or a suicidal mood, the researchers explained.

In addition, most of the apps allow users to share their health information with others, but the researchers found that often this was through insecure methods. Only two-thirds of the apps had a written privacy policy spelling out how they protect or use the information supplied by users.

In Developing Countries, Remote Regions Mobile Health Devices can Improve Health Care Access
An article in CMAJ states that mobile health technology has substantial potential for improving access to health care in the developing world and in remote regions of developed countries.

This is better than previous studies of all mHealth apps have found, but still troubling to the researchers because the apps in this study were supposed to be the most top-notch.

"We found that the consumer-generated rating on the app store is a very poor marker of how usable an app is, and whether a physician would recommend it. Clearly, the work is not done once consumers have rated an app," Singh added.

Mobile Health Technology
In a report submitted by the WHO it was found that eight in 10 countries are making use of mobile phone services to improve health care.

The study was published in the journal Health Affairs.

Source-IANS