The year is drawing to a close, and as some take the time to look back on personal highlights, we've taken the time to compile some mobile health highlights, mostly through numbers. While bigger research companies have forecasted potential growth in the space four or five years ahead, other surveys and studies offer different takeaways on digital health today -- from iPad vs iPhone comparisons to data privacy estimates for health tracking app users.

95M Americans used mobile for health in 2013

As of 2013, 95 million Americans are using mobile phones as health tools or to find health information, according to Manhattan Research. That’s 27 percent more than 2012, when the number was 75 million. More>>

Pew: 35 percent of US adults are online diagnosers

When it comes to looking for health information online, consumers have had fairly consistent behaviors over the past 12 years. A report, Online Health 2013, from The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project found that of the 81 percent of US adults who use the internet, 72 percent have gone online to look for health information in the past year. Some 59 percent of that online health information seeker group went online to specifically try to figure out what medical condition they or someone they know has. Pew calls this group “online diagnosers” and it includes about 35 percent of all US adults. More>>

Seven in ten doctors have a self-tracking patient

Seventy percent of doctors report that at least one patient is sharing some form of health measurement data with them, according to Manhattan Research’s annual “Taking the Pulse” online survey of 2,950 practicing physicians. More>>

Survey: 31 percent of doctors make Rx decisions from smartphones

Nearly three-quarters of physicians in the United States are using their smartphones at work, according to a March 2013 survey conducted by ad agency WPP’s Kantar Media. The survey of more than 3,000 physicians representing 21 specialties found that 74 percent said they were using their smartphones for professional purposes. The 2012 study found that about 68 percent of physicians were using their smartphones at work and 64 percent were in 2011. More>>

Pew: Caregivers are top digital health users, but only 59 percent find online tools helpful

Research from the Pew Internet and American Life Project shows that adults who are unpaid caregivers for a parent or child use online and mobile health tools considerably more than the average American, but only 59 percent of connected caregivers find internet tools helpful in giving care. Fifty-two percent said that online tools helped them deal with the stress of being a caregiver. More>>

Manhattan: 72 percent of physicians have tablets

Manhattan Research shared a few more numbers from its annual “Taking the Pulse” online research survey of 2,950 physicians in a webinar. The numbers showed that smartphone, desktop and laptop use has leveled out among physicians while tablet adoption has risen to 72 percent, up from 62 percent last year. The 62 percent number was a surprise for Manhattan last year, more than doubling 2011′s 30 percent metric. More>>

Survey: 43 percent of doctors use mobiles for clinical purposes

A survey by Deloitte found that 43 percent of doctors use smartphones or tablets for clinical purposes, which the firm suggested included EHR access, e-prescribing, and physician-to-physician communication. The study polled 613 physicians in the United States. More>>

IMS: Half of Android health apps have fewer than 500 downloads

There are more than 43,000 healthcare apps available from the US iTunes store, but only about 16,275 of those are patient-facing apps with “genuine” health content, according to a study from the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics. Furthermore, in an analysis of the Google Play Store, IMS found that 50 percent of health apps are downloaded fewer than 500 times and just five apps account for 15 percent of all health app downloads. More>>