The invasion of m-Health and its utility in COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has led an unexpected acceleration of mobile-health (m-Health) with the adoption of telemedicine, remote monitoring, and several other digital approaches. These changes occurred rapidly in a few weeks and are likely to remain even when the emergency will be over. Thus, m-health tools, wearables, and remote medicine may replace or, at least, support the traditional face-to-face contact between patients and clinicians. This is particularly true in the area of cardiovascular diseases as it is now technically possible to collect remotely a vast range of data, such as blood pressure, heart rate and its regularity, heart sounds, body weight, sugar and cholesterol levels, electrocardiogram, respiratory rate in addition to symptoms. Several aspects, however, are still a challenge and need to be resolved. Reimbursement has to be changed in order to equally support the digital transformation. Aspects related to privacy, liability, regulatory issues, and even research need to be addressed in a fair and firm way for both clinicians and technology developers. At present, these are still barriers to the implementation of m-health. Governments should provide more education on m-health to support healthcare professionals and citizens (especially the elderly) with the digitalisation revolution. A “Digital divide” for those with poor income or poor access to high-speed internet or personal computers should also be recognised and improved to avoid to be excluded from the benefits of m-health.

The present review article is about all this. First, we define what m-health is, then we consider the good and bad of m-health in general terms and in the context of COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, we argue that more concrete involvement and effort is needed by the multi-stakeholders of healthcare system to evaluate, improve, and govern m-health and the digital future.