In an iHealthBeat Special Report, engineering and technology experts discussed how new uses for cell phones are helping to facilitate diagnoses and speed access to patient information.
The Special Report includes comments from:
- John Guttag, an electrical engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology;
- Richard LaFleur, medical director for Anthem Blue Cross in New Hampshire;
- Larry Lotenero, chief information officer at the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center; and
- Boris Rubinsky, a professor of bioengineering and mechanical engineering at the University of California-Berkeley.
Guttag and his team at MIT are working on a cell phone application that would let emergency responders send video images from an ambulance to a hospital, allowing a physician to assess the situation while a patient is en route.
An Anthem Blue Cross pilot program allows physicians to use cell phones to access electronic health records, and some hospitals are using text messages to tell patients to take their medications or send other reminders.
However, Lotenero said lost or stolen phones can become easy targets for unauthorized access to patient data.
"They become open devices which anybody can pick it up and just sort of browse around the thing," he said (Kennedy,
iHealthBeat, 5/23).
Running Time: 10:00