Apps & Software News

New Survey Blames Healthcare for mHealth’s Struggles

An Adobe study of consumer mHealth attitudes finds that healthcare providers and payers aren't meeting the needs of an increasingly mobile-savvy public.

By Eric Wicklund

- A new survey says the healthcare industry is to blame for slow mHealth adoption.

Adobe Digital Insights’ survey of 1,000 consumers finds that those who know how to use a mobile device are twice as likely to say the quality of healthcare has improved over the past five years. That’s because they know how to use mHealth tools and find health information, whereas consumers waiting for their healthcare provider or health plan to reach out to them aren’t seeing any benefits.

“The problem is that the healthcare industry, in general, hasn’t yet caught up to be able to deliver on people’s digital demands and expectations,” Matthew Roberts, an analyst at ADI, said in remarks accompanying the survey. “Furthermore, we’re seeing that the companies that are delivering smartphone experiences, such as apps, are not doing enough in driving awareness and adoption.”

As a case in point, more than a third of those surveyed said they don’t even know if their healthcare provider has an mHealth platform. And only 43 percent said their health insurer has an mHealth app for managing health-related matters.

According to the survey, more than half of those surveyed who have used mHealth tools would prefer to use only mobile devices. And more than half say they’re comfortable using digital health apps to diagnose their symptoms.

The ADI survey continues a recent trend in research that indicates consumers and providers have different perceptions of mHealth. In some cases, providers and health plans are creating online portals but failing to make their mobile-compatible; in other cases, health systems aren’t creating the mHealth resources that consumers want.

Earlier this year, Accenture released a report indicating only 2 percent of patients in the nation’s best hospitals are using their apps. It found the healthcare industry at fault for creating mHealth tools that don’t address the needs of patients.

“Simply having a mobile app is not enough,” Brian Kalis, managing director of Accenture’s health practice, said. “Hospital apps are failing to engage patients by not aligning their functionality and user experience with what consumers expect and need. Consumers want ubiquitous access to products and services as part of their customer experience, and those who become disillusioned with a provider’s mobile services - or a lack thereof - could look elsewhere for services.”

In a separate analysis, ADI examined 34 billion app downloads and visits to healthcare sites in 2015, and found that the ratio of mHealth traffic to payer and provider sites is 24 percent lower than desktop traffic. But when consumers simply look up health information, the ratio of mHealth traffic to desktop traffic is only 6 percent less.

Roberts says the online health information industry – think WebMD and Google – is drawing mHealth traffic on a par with online-savvy industries like travel, retail and banking.

“They’re driving a lot of traffic to their mobile sites and are stacking up quite well against industries such as travel and retail,” he said. “It’s the health insurers and healthcare providers that aren’t doing a good job of converting some of their traffic onto mobile platforms. These companies are still very desktop-centric.”

According to the survey, less than 40 percent said their insurer is doing a good job using the technology at hand to help members manage their health, and only 42 percent are very or extremely satisfied with their insurer’s online tools. Furthermore, when looking for health-related information, they’ll first go to a health information website or an online search engine before considering their provider or health plan.

In the end, both the Accenture and ADI surveys warn that healthcare providers and payers need to step up their mHealth game – or risk losing business.

“Today’s consumers place more expectations on their providers to interact digitally, driven by the customer experiences they have had with services in other industries, and most providers are letting them down,” the Accenture report, released in January, concluded. “Thus in the increasingly competitive healthcare market, providers that ignore the mobility needs of today’s always-on patients could lose them to competitors.”

Dig Deeper:

mHealth Apps Are Failing the Usability Test

Are Patients More Satisfied with mHealth Than Their Providers?

Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information
©2012-2024 TechTarget, Inc. Xtelligent Healthcare Media is a division of TechTarget. All rights reserved. HealthITAnalytics.com is published by Xtelligent Healthcare Media a division of TechTarget.