By Matt Kuhrt
The incredible spread of health-based technology geared toward consumers, from wearable devices to mobile apps, has generated notice among many in the medical community. A new study demonstrating the benefits of texting interventions to encourage increased physical activity among cardiology patients suggests the cell phone may be a promising--but largely untapped--clinical resource, according to an article in the Boston Globe.
The use of texting to encourage physical activity isn't exactly a new idea. As early as 2013 a Duke University study showed potential for text-based interventions for weight control. Since then, the use of consumer technology has only grown. Nevertheless, despite the increasing usage of mobile phones and the popularity of texting as a primary means of interpersonal communication, medical practices have been slow to adopt the technology for clinical use.
This lag may be due to fee-for-service reimbursement, which offers doctors little incentive to implement new technologies, or even to undertake the extra cost of increased digital communication, as pointed out by Robert Pearl, CEO of Permanent Medical Group. Those incentives could finally start to change as the industry moves toward value-based payment models.
Additional technology to facilitate the implementation and use of texting should also help drive increased use of text interventions. Seth Martin, M.D., a cardiologist at Johns Hopkins Hospital, helped to design an automated system that uses data from patients' fitness trackers to monitor their activity and send them texts that reinforce high levels of activity or encourage them to get out and move if their levels are below their targets.
In the associated study, 81 percent of patients who received texts hit their goal of 10,000 steps per day, as opposed to 44 percent of those in the control groups.
To learn more:
- read the story in the Boston Globe
- look at the Journal of the American Heart Association study