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(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-02-25 09:50
"Sixty percent of the time, you can replace the doctor," Pedro Yrigoyen, co-founder of MedicallHome says, highlighting the fact that mobile phones outnumber fixed lines in Mexico by five-to-one. "Public healthcare is overwhelmed. People wait for hours just to see the doctor." Elizabeth Boehm, an analyst at research group Forrester, sees the potential for mobile phones to help in public health information campaigns, but also points out limitations. "One of the main challenges, in mobile health, is that people who are most in need of healthcare are usually more aged, so they don't use the mobile or they're not comfortable with it," she says. In the developed world, researchers are also looking for ways to harness mobile technology. In several countries, diabetes sufferers can measure their blood sugar level with a device connected to a mobile phone which sends the data to doctors to verify. Other applications are seen for monitoring people with heart problems or Alzheimer's disease. In the United States, a service called "Foodphone" enables a user to take a photo of his or her food before a meal and send it to an expert who replies with information about the nutritional value. |
