Are We Overthinking Patients Downloading Healthcare Apps?

I just bought a new cell phone (The Google Pixel 4a for those that wonder and yes, it says a lot about me).  I’m an Android user and always have been an Android user.  I also use Google voice, so switching phones was easy.  I logged in with my Google account and everything was ready to go (Note: there’s probably a lesson here for Healthcare too).  I had to log into a few apps and redo my home screen, but that’s about it.

What was interesting about this experience is that I realized that I had 163 apps installed on my phone.  163!  I couldn’t believe it.  Talk about app proliferation.  As I thought about it, there are probably 5-10 apps (email, social, maps, text, scriptures) that I use every day or at least multiple times a week.  There are 15-20 apps I use a few times a month (food, flight, documents, games).  The rest of the apps I use pretty rarely.  While there are some I should get rid of (old conference apps), most of them are things that I may use in the future (parking app) so there’s no reason for me to get rid of them.  However, they play such a little part of my day that they certainly don’t influence my life.

Now think about this from a digital health app perspective.  What would it take for a mobile health app to really breakthrough and have a permanent home on my device?  You’ll notice that none of the apps that cracked my regular usage are health apps unless you consider the damage of social media to my health.  I literally work in the digital health space and I can’t remember the last time I opened a health related app on my phone.  I used to look at Google Fit every once in a while to see my steps, but I’m not sure it’s even tracking that anymore.  Plus, I work without my phone for most of the day, so the data’s not that good anyway.

Pamela Landis in the recent #hcldr Twitter chat framed it this way:

T3 How about this for an idea? Instead of building yet another comms or portal app, we figure out how to leverage existing ones like SMS and dare I say Twitter DMs, FB messenger etc as a way to connect with our patients. Go where they are. #hcldr

— Pamela (@plandis1) September 1, 2021

I’ve written before about the power of text messages.  They’re ubiquitous.  They’re read almost instantly.  There’s almost nothing you can’t communicate through text.  Plus, it doesn’t require a patient to download an app to their phone.  Just like every medical office has a fax machine, every patient with a cell phone has a texting app they know how to use.

If I think back to the best patient care I’ve ever gotten on my cell phone, I think about the doctors I know who I text about my health issues.  No doubt, I’m privileged to know a lot of doctors who are happy to reply to a text because they’re my friends.  That’s not scalable.  However, it illustrates the potential power of a text message.

I’m sure we’ll see some breakthrough healthcare apps that are worth the download for patients.  If you look at a company like 98point6 who provides text-based primary care anywhere, they use an app and have been quite successful.  Ironically, the killer healthcare app that is worthy of our home screens might be an app like 98point6 that connects patients to an actual care provider.  The problem is that most digital health apps don’t create that connection.  They’re doing something quite different.  When that’s the case, those companies should seriously consider Pam Landis’ advice above and meet the patients where they are using SMS, Facebook, Twitter, etc.