Two-thirds of healthcare providers plan to increase mHealth expenditures in 2012

Two-thirds of healthcare providers in the U.S. plan to implement or improve their use of mobile technologies in the next 12 months, according to a new survey conducted by CompTIA.

Source: CompTIA

The report indicated that more than 50 percent of healthcare professionals already use smartphones for their work. 38% of physicians with a smartphone are using medical-related apps on a daily basis and half of them are expected to do so over the next 12 months. At the same time, 25% of healthcare providers are already using tablets and another 21% expect to do so in the coming year.

"While laptop and notebook PCs are commonplace in the medical community, the next wave of mobile adoption is well underway as providers turn to tablets, smartphones and applications to increase productivity and improve patient care," the authors noted.

The report shows that almost one-third of providers use smartphones or tablets to access Electronic Medical Records or Electronic Health Records systems, with 20% expecting to start engaging in this mobile usage within the next year.

While mobile health (mHealth) is on the rise the use of telemedicine solutions remains low, with just 14% of healthcare professionals actively following news and trends in telemedicine and 37% expressing little interest in the topic.

Healthcare providers see the greatest benefits of telemedicine in the areas of continuing medical education (61%), specialist referral services (44%) and patient consultations (37%).

The U.S. helathcare sector employs over 17 million workers. The total healthcare spending will total over $2.7 trillion in 2011, making it the single largest componenet of the U.S. GDP.