Alessandra Bongiovanni Module 1
How Smartpohones Are Facilitating Better Health Care
By Tara Culp-Ressler
Think Progress
As we all know smartphones is one material item many of us cannot live without. There is a good percentage of us that own a smartphone and us it in our work setting to either look up a disease or a particular medication and of course for other health-related information. Being a person with an honest addiction to their smartphone, I find it amazing that you can download an application at the touch of button and instantly have thousands of bits of information with regards to medicine and healthcare. As noted in the article, mHealth is helping to improve healthcare. What makes mHealth great is that it provides non-medical professionals with access to these applications as well. Individuals are able to keep track of the blood pressure, pregnancy, and research just about anything in healthcare. Just the other day I downloaded an application called MapMyRun and for someone who is into excersing or needs to exercise it maps the distance you run, walk, or bike and it provides the speed at which are traveling and even gives information on nutrition. An application that is so simple does so much for the person who is looking to get in shape and eat healthy.
The article chosen is based on researched information found through Allied Health World discussing the rise of mobile applications to manage health. The article addresses a trend in healthcare today with the use of technology through our smartphones and accessing medical information. Due to the fact that there seems to be many applications available understanding which ones are accurate and able to trusted is vital. With this in mind, the solution to this is that the FDA is now involved and has provided guidelines that need to be met before an application is accessible to consumers. When it comes to our health, no one wants to be given misleading or false information and the fact that the FDA has taken control of what information is released is great.
At the current time, smartphones are my current place of work are not allowed, but as mentioned they are used to access information that we can use in our practice and provide to our patients. With that, I believe that hospitals and all kinds of health facilities should allow health professionals to access this information whenever needed. There are other means of accessing these applications and that can be through the use of tablets as well. If smartphones are to remain unallowed, then providing workers with a tablet can prove to be very helpful. Working in an acute-care setting, I witness doctors and other practitioners on their phones attempting to access medical information and I don't believe they should be the only ones allowed to do so. We as healthcare providers are in between important information that we are keeping from our patients who do not have access to a tablet or smartphone or the internet for that matter and such important information can change someone's life for the better. With that, I believe that the use of smartphones at work can be more than beneficial for the practitioner and the patient.
