Mobile Computing Can Revolutionize Health Care

Mobile Internet usage is predicted to overtake desktop usage by 2014, as it has already overtaken local demographic searches. Mobile network providers are developing 3G and 4G networks to accommodate our insatiable consumption of data and, boy, are they charging for it!

Adopting the Technology

All of this is very interesting, but how far along are physicians and other healthcare providers in adopting this technology? It turns out that we are doing quite well. Monique Levy, VP of research at Manhattan Research, recently said that 62 percent of all physicians have some type of tablet device and that the iPad was the dominant device. In a recent article on the LANDesk blog, Steve Workman noted that 81 percent of all physicians now have smartphones, and 75 percent of us own an Apple device. In fact, 79 percent of us who use a mobile device for clinical use prefer an iPad. As it turns out, if you have a smartphone, a tablet and a desktop computer, you will actually increase your usage of the Internet and not cannibalize the use of one device.

But what about our patients? Are they adopting this technology? They are: Sixty-two percent of our patients have adopted some type of tablet device, and their use of smartphones is very high as well. The question then becomes, how are we using this technology to communicate with our patients, and is it an asset or a liability?

Stay tuned—that is the subject of my next column.

Rodney Lusk, MD, is director of the Boys Town Ear, Nose and Throat Clinic and Cochlear Implant Center at Boys Town National Research Hospital in Omaha, Neb. He has been working with EMRs since 1996. He may be reached at rodney.lusk@boystown.org.