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Why Angry Birds Gets More Play Than Health Apps


I have been musing about why, despite our fascination with gadgets and timesaving devices, so few of us use the apps and tools that have been developed to help us take care of ourselves.

The range of options is staggering – my iPhone coughed up 52 applications for medication reminders just now – but most of us don’t make use of the (often free) high-tech help available to us.  There are hundreds of websites and portals to help us monitor our diets, physical activity and blood sugar, talk to our doctors by e-mail and understand our test results.  Apps can help us watch for drug interactions, unravel our test results, adjust our hearing aids and track our symptoms.  Devices can monitor whether our mom is moving around her house this morning or continuously monitor our vital signs.

Interesting ideas.  Modest pickup.

In an essay published in the May issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine supplement “Cyberinfrastructure for Consumer Health,” I make some observations about why this may be so, based on my experience as a person who daily responds to an exciting variety of chronic and acute conditions that ebb and flow in my body.  My remarks are addressed to those who fund and develop devices and Web-based tools to help those of us with chronic conditions better care for ourselves.Continue reading…

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