The Mayo Clinic offered up its first free mobile app for patients this week, according to a report over at MedCity News. While Mayo has more than a dozen apps in Apple's AppStore for both the iPhone and the iPad, MedCity points out that none of those were free patient-facing apps -- until now.

The app, called Patient, went live on Monday and is free to download for anyone, but the real meat of it is only accessible by patients who have a Mayo Clinic patient online services account number. Patients who log in get access to their medical record, lab results, appointment schedule, and more. The app also includes a feature that enables patients to request an appointment, refill prescriptions, get health recommendations, and notifications and alerts about "important information". The app also enables secure messaging between patients and their care team.

The publicly available features include information about navigating the Mayo Clinic campus and the surrounding areas, news and videos about the Mayo Clinic, and more.

Mayo Clinic's associate dean of e-health and medical director of Institutional Business Solutions Dr. Sidna Tulledge-Scheitel told MedCity News that the app intends to help the healthcare provider connect with prospective patients, first time patients, and existing patients. Dr. Tulledge-Scheitel said that patients can use the app after a visit to the Mayo Clinic to view notes about what the doctor said during their appointment. (Sounds like Mayo paid attention to the 2010 OpenNotes study.)

An Android version of Mayo's Patient app is in the works.

Check out this video about the app over Mayo's news blog.
More details in MedCity News' interview with Dr. Tulledge-Scheitel.