Care Innovations recently featured a blog post outlining four mobile health trends shaping 2015. Brian Dolan, MobiHealth News Editor-in-Chief, provided an overview of these emerging technologies in a webinar about Digital Mobile Health Trends in 2015.
The four trends Dolan outlined are below:
1. Reimbursements are starting to come through for digital devices
One of the biggest challenges for developers of emerging technologies is normalizing them into their current system. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) have announced a reimbursement code for telemedicine devices that support patients with two or more chronic conditions.
2. Important regulation updates on the horizon
Dolan feels 2015 is the year for change and developments with the Software Act. The legislation has the potential to alter the way the FDA looks at software and medical applications. The FDA is currently authoring two "guidance" documents that provide insight into how it is thinking about connected devices. Dolan said the updates to regulations and guidelines are positive changes that could do great things for the intellectual databank in the healthcare industry.
3. Video visits taking off - and gaining traction
Video visits would allow doctors and patients to meet on videoconferencing instead on in-office. Business are ready to embrace this idea as a way to keep employees healthy and at their desks. A recent study found that 60% of patients surveyed would be in favor of videoconferencing with their doctor instead of traveling in for a visit.
4. Funding
Medical technology has increased in funding from 2014 to 2015 by venture capitalists and other invesment entities. Dolan cited Rock Health's reasearch on investment, which shows that investors put $1.8 billion on the table for health companies in 2013. This number jumped to $4 billion in 2014. Dolan doesn't believe this trend will continue on the same path of growth, but he does anticipate that there will still be billion of new investment dollars in healthcare technology this year.
To read the full post, click here.