Technology Salon

In our September Technology Salon, we took on James BonTempo’s pertinent question of What Does the “m” in mHealth Really Mean? in a spirited debate with technology and development practitioners.

Is this mHealthcare? (photo: Data Dyne)

We were seeking a better definition of mHealth than the current focus on devices, and specifically the hype around mobile phones. As one participant bemoaned, it seems that every health project with a mobile phone or PDA, no matter their usage, is now an mHealth project.

So we sought to put parameters on what could be called an mHealth project, and through that, come up with a new definition for mHealth. After an hour of vibrant debate, we developed these four aspects for mHealth projects:

In last month’s Technology Salon, we looked at Health Information Systems that improved reporting systems for governments. But what about improving patient care? Giving clinicians support and feedback at the point of care can bring about immediate changes in diagnosis and treatment, and start the reporting process with high-quality data.

In this month’s Technology Salon, National Health Information Systems: Who Uses What, Where?, we discussed a recently-completed study by Vital Wave Consulting that surveyed the global landscape of national HIS ecosystems in the developing world. The overall outcome may surprise development practitioners, but its well known to IT experts: basic change management matters more than fancy technology.