How mHealth tech is changing diabetes treatment | #eHealthPromotion, #SaluteSocial | Scoop.it

Today's mobile apps are helping diabetics aggregate blood sugar and nutritional data from multiple platforms and devices and logging data into central portals accessible anywhere, according to Steve Robinson, general manager of the Cloud Platform Services Division for IBM.

The apps and snap-on smartphone monitoring devices are letting physicians integrate biometric data from wearables into patient data and analyze patient data at fast speed, Robinson writes at InformationWeek. The benefits are just as extensive as the functionality being developed, he says

The gains include everything from simplifying records and improving doctor-patient conversations to gaining a holistic view of a diabetic's health. Doctors can "crunch and analyze patient data at rapid speeds to help identify patterns and predict future health and treatment needs," he writes.

"Mobile apps can help diabetes sufferers get ahead of their symptoms and live healthier, more carefree lives," Robinson says. 

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Diabetes tools have ranged from providing smartphone coaching that is helping diabetics living in low to modest socioeconomic communities manage their disease and improving their health, to a wearable, automated bionic pancreas for continuous glucose monitor and a software algorithm, according to a study at the New England Journal of Medicine.

In addition, mobile monitoring of diabetic employees can save more than $3,000 a year in healthcare costs, half of the average annual medical insurance cost for workers diagnosed with diabetes. 

Today's tools and cloud-based capabilities are reducing those costs while also driving innovation for disease management, Robinson says.

"Using cloud services, combined with the ease and convenience of mobile, new methods of managing this disease are being brought to patients around the world," he writes.

For more information:
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Via Celine Sportisse, DIRECT MEDICA by Webhelp, dbtmobile