mHealth Adoption To Skyrocket By 2020

By Katie Wike, contributing writer

Data from a recent report by Juniper Research indicates the number of mHealth users will increase to 157 million by the year 2020.

“The adoption of mHealth information services will significantly increase as service providers roll out initiatives to tackle issues such as infant mortality and infectious diseases,” explains an announcement. “SMS, Apps and IVR (Interactive Voice Response) services are providing vital information to those who cannot access general healthcare services.”

The report noted this increase will be fueled by “initiatives such as the MOTECH Foundation, which aims to implement preventative healthcare by educating the population on issues such as sexual health and pregnancy.” Researchers also note, “Limited access to connected devices and low literacy rates had resulted in many mHealth services being offered through contact centers.”

Fierce Mobile Healthcare writes the accompanying whitepaper outlines the fact that apps, messaging, and interactive voice response tools are increasingly being tapped to provide healthcare in remote areas.

Juniper Research also predicts remote patient monitoring for chronic illness will increase from 400,000 users in 2016 to 1.4 million worldwide by 2020. “The use of remote monitoring is set to rise swiftly as new entrants gain [U.S.Food and Drugs Administration] approval,” the paper's authors write. “However, our research noted that there is a need for new entrants to prove their hardware is able to measure health indicators with the same accuracy as standard medical devices.”