Payment challenges and a lack of connectivity between mobile technology and electronic health record systems are hindering widespread adoption of smartphones among physician practices, American Medical News reports.
Reimbursement Issues
Most doctors do not receive reimbursement for electronic communication with patients.
According to a PwC Health Research Institute report released last month, only about half of patients are willing to pay for a mobile health technology device, with most saying they would prefer to spend less than $10 monthly for the service.
Connectivity Challenges
The majority of physicians who use smartphones in their practice are unable to connect the devices to an EHR system because of a lack of bandwidth. Therefore, physicians generally are unable to use mobile devices for patient monitoring and other purposes.
According to the PwC report, many doctors say that a portion of their office visits could be eliminated if they had the ability to use smartphones for mobile patient monitoring (Dolan, American Medical News, 10/4).
