Ever since Apple’s AppStore created a dedicated category for medical applications for the iPhone and iTouch, it seems that — as Apple’s Mark Wilson put it today at the World Wide Developers Conference — “The medical community is flocking to the iPhone.”
To put today’s launch of the iPhone 3.0 in perspective, we’ve assembled a list of just some of the health-related milestones that the iPhone has experienced during the past eight months. While it’s not the only mobile platform out there, it’s hard to argue with the fact that the iPhone has attracted more developers and therefore more applications and services for the medical community than any other on the market today.
Here’s a look back on the events that led to the iPhone’s growing importance for the medical field:
November 29, 2008: A medical student successfully lobbies Apple to create a “medical” category for applications in the AppStore that would include mostly applications for physicians, nurses and other healthcare workers. The new category took 82 applications from the still existing Health & Fitness category and marked the first spin-off category Apple has created. More
January 22, 2009: Epocrates Essentials becomes available in Apple’s AppStore for iPhone and iTouch users. More
February 12, 2009: During a question and answer period at a medical records event in Palm Springs, CA, the Food and Drug Administration’s Don Witters says that there may be circumstances where the iPhone should be considered a medical device and regulated as one. More
March 17, 2009: At Apple’s special sneak preview of iPhone OS 3.0, Scott Forstall, SVP of iPhone Software at Apple gushed: “Now here’s a class [of services] that we think will be really interesting: medical devices.” Forstall explained that the new iPhone OS will allow application developers to sync medical devices like BP monitors via both Bluetooth and USB. “So imagine the possibilities,” Forstall continued. “We think this is profound.” Apple then invited a rep from LifeScan, a Johnson & Johnson company onstage to demonstrate how a Bluetooth-enabled blood glucose monitor synchs up to a diabetes management application running on the iPhone. More and More
March 31, 2009: An iPhone developer uses Google Health’s API to create Health Cloud, which allows Google Health users to view their personal health record from their iPhone. Google has yet to take the PHR mobile itself. More
April 8, 2009: AirStrip Technologies announced that the FDA had granted the company’s iPhone application, AirStrip OB, clearance to market the app to physicians via Apple’s App Store. AirStrip OB enables obstetricians to use their iPhones to remotely access real-time and historical waveform data for both the mother and the baby. The data set includes heart tracings, contraction patterns, nursing notes and exam status. The app pulls the data from the hospitals’ labor and delivery units. AirStrip has been planning its iPhone launch since July of 2008. More
April 9, 2009: By many accounts, Sarasota-based start-up Voalte steals the show at the HIMSS event in Chicago with its iPhone-based voice, alarm, text service for physicians, nurses and other hospital workers. More
April 15, 2009: Manhattan Research finds that twice as many doctors are using iPhones in 2009 than were in 2008. More
April 17, 2009: A pediatrician in New York is the first to access Allscripts’ popular electronic medical record using the company’s new iPhone application. More
April 21, 2009: The “medical” category in Apple’s iPhone AppStore becomes the third fastest growing category of applications for the first quarter of 2009, according to O’Reilly Radar.
April 30, 2009: Doylestown Hospital, located outside of Philadelphia, PA, recently outfitted its 360 independent physicians and hospital staff with 3G iPhones in an effort to help them save time, be more productive and provide better care for their patients. More
May 1, 2009: Winner of the $10,000 DiabetesMine Challenge effectively turns the iPhone into the controller for a combined glucose meter + insulin pump. More
May 5, 2009: At the height of the “swine flu” or H1N1 media frenzy, a number of quick coding developers created apps that helped people track swine flu cases’ locations, determine if their symptoms were signs of swine flu and more. The rush to create swine flu apps demonstrated the platform’s ability to offer timely applications to the market when needed, which could come in handy for future public health events. More
May 29, 2009: Dr. Natalie Hodge emerges as “The First iPhone Doctor” by running a pediatrics concierge service called Personal Pediatrics almost entirely from her iPhone. More
May 31, 2009: Scott Eising, director of product management for Mayo Clinic Internet Services, said the launch of the iPhone and the success of its AppStore convinced him and his colleagues that the time to figure out a mobile strategy is now. More
June 8, 2009: At Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference AirStrip’s Dr. Cameron Powell takes the stage to demonstrate how the new iPhone 3.0 operating system lets “push” notifications from its remote wireless monitoring device transmit EKG systems to a doctor’s or clinician’s mobile phone. Apple’s Mark Wilson reportedly said that “The medical community is flocking to the iPhone” at the WWDC event during his introductory remarks for AirStrip. More
What did we miss?
June 8th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
Brian – Great recap. Thank you for putting it all in one place. It is amazing what the iPhone has done for mobility and I believe we haven’t seen anything yet in terms of what will be possible in healthcare (perhaps only in our brainstorming dreams).
Palm had the attention of physicians early on and then died … RIM had a chance to fill the void during those years but have never gained enough traction (except with administrators but not really with clinicians). And now the iPhone is really walking into a largely untapped market.
Cheers,
Jose HC
http://m-strat.org
http://virtuate.ca
@mstrat or @virtuate
June 8th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
This is great. Our company CSI just released a fully secure PHR for the iPhone called motionPHR.
It is interesting to me that we keep seeing pictures of iPhones with x-rays like in this article. We are going to have to have a lot more storage on the phone to display an image that would be of use to the medical community. It is a good marketing tool though.
Jeff
June 8th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
The new Push feature of the iPhone 3GS is good but the iPhone still does not support multi-tasking because of what Apple explains is a power drain. I see this as a problem when trying to use for medical or enterprise application.
Jeff
motionPHR, Personal Health Record for the iPhone
June 9th, 2009 at 12:55 am
[...] muy interesante el desarrollo en el tiempo del Iphone como herramienta medica que aparece en [...]
June 9th, 2009 at 2:13 am
Jeff,
Two questions:
How large are the X-ray pictures that would be useful?
Please explain how the lack of multi tasking would not suffice for these medical apps? I think it is very clear that these apps are for ‘novel’ and secondary purposes…to assist doctors. Certainly, an iPhone will not be the key ingredient in performing any sorts of surgeries, and I’ll go out on a limb to say that there is no way the FDA will approve these apps if a battery die cause any substantial harm to the patients.
thoughts?
June 9th, 2009 at 8:10 am
[...] This post was Twitted by lukegilliam – Real-url.org [...]
June 11th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
Great article! I have been using TheCarrot.com on my iPhone to proactively manage my health and wellness. I understand the founder developed the app to help mange his asthma and his father-in-law manage diabetes. Based on its success, they developed a bunch of other free, integrated trackers and a great reporting tool to help people like me who want to be active in managing my health. It’s a great tool and they’ve been incredibly responsive to user suggestions for new apps. They recently release women’s health trackers and an app for the swine flu. Check them out — http://www.thecarrot.com.
Carla
July 15th, 2009 at 10:59 am
May 1, 2009: Winner of the $10,000 DiabetesMine Challenge effectively turns the iPhone into the controller for a combined glucose meter + insulin pump:
http://www.diabetesmine.com/2009/05/design-challenge-envisioning-the-iphone-as-a-diabetes-life-device.html
and an industrial design student envisions the iPhone as a continuous glucose monitor:
http://www.diabetesmine.com/2009/07/the-future-of-cgm.html
Check these out – they far exceed simple medical “apps”
July 15th, 2009 at 11:43 am
Amy — I added the DiabetesMine competition winner. Certainly a milestone.
July 16th, 2009 at 1:32 am
Does anyone have any data on the # of docs/health care professionals are using iPhones, Blackberrys & Palm devices? And if so, more granular info on types of docs/professionals using them, for what applications, etc.?
July 22nd, 2009 at 3:30 pm
A very exciting article and it speaks to the capabilities of the iPhone to help save more lives! EMS Options, LLC, developed smart-ICE, the smart application providing critical medical information to Police, Fire and EMS personnel in the event the patient can not speak for themselves. smart-ICE utilizes an internationlally recognized symbol, that will gain the attention of emergency personnel and includes an internal feature to alert the first responder if the patient becomes unconscious. With the ability to store current medical problems, medications, allergies, hospitalizations and much more, smart-ICE carries the ICE (In Case of Emergency) concept to a whole new level for smartphones!
November 10th, 2009 at 7:59 pm
[...] “Timeline: The iPhone as a Medical Tool” (MHN – 6/8/09) [...]
January 11th, 2010 at 10:25 am
[...] It doesn’t seem like much of a stretch, Apple already demonstrated medical appls such as live EKG readings via push notifications with the release of iPhone OS 3.0, so this only makes logical sense. And [...]
January 22nd, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Rapitube is an advanced airway management app. Rapitube drug doses are presented for standard rapid sequence intubation (RSI), as well as the standard equipment sizes. This includes both adult and pediatric doses.