This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, July 18, 2011 - A smart phone could become as important as a thermometer in evaluating your child's health. Developers are rolling out medical software applications, or apps, for a variety of health conditions such as treating a vomiting child and managing a bed bug infestation. St. Louis Children's Hospitalentered the market last year with an iPhone app called Kid Care. Last month, the hospital announced an Android version.
While some apps may be based on junk science, often downloaded and quickly forgotten, the program from Children's Hospital offers evidence-based information developed by a physician and reviewed further by medical experts at the hospital.
Suzi Wells, manager of the Answer Line program at the hospital, said the smart phone app can help busy parents make quick and knowledgeable decisions when a children faces a medical problem.
"I have a daughter with two children, age 7 and 3 1/2," said Wells, a nurse, "and she has the Kid Care app on her phone. I encouraged it because it puts important and trusted medical information at her fingertips."
The application's extensive range of medical data is similar to pediatric, health and wellness information a parent can get from a trusted doctor. A parent can select a medical symptom, and the application will offer advice, beginning with the most urgent medical response. The advice ranges from suggestions that the parent call 911, go to the nearest emergency room, call the family doctor the next morning or ways to treat the child at home.
"What happens with the phone application is that it gives the parent the capability to connect with a nurse," Wells says. That happens when the user presses the right button and is hooked to Children's special health phone line -- 454 KIDS -- that is staffed by RNs, she said.
"Common health problems for children include vomiting, diarrhea, asthma, respiratory illnesses and allergies. The purpose of the app is to help educate the public and provide tools in real time to help people make decisions."
She said the medical content for Kid Care was developed by Dr. Barton Schmitt, author of pediatric guidelines used in call centers. Children's has a medical advisory board that reviews Schmitt's content.
Bed Bugs
New medical applications are being rolled out rapidly. For instance, one application will soon focus exclusively on helping public health officials and parents control bed bugs. This one is being developed at the University of Missouri-St. Louis through a grant from the Environmental Protection Agency. University officials have yet to discuss the project, but EPA spokesperson Dale Kemery recently confirmed the project was in the works.
Unlike the application from Children's, the EPA-funded material targets a single problem. Kemery said the goal is to help residents address beg bugs' infestation, which is widespread in poor communities and "proactively avoid a larger contamination problem."
The information will be available on a "smart phone-friendly website," Kemery said, because Pew research shows consumer preferences for the ways they access information changes often.
Kemery said the UMSL application points to Pew findings showing that while minority households trail the majority population in ownership of desktop computers for internet access, minorities "exceed the majority population in ownership and use of mobile devices."
He says bed bugs are being targeted because they pose numerous health problems.
"Many people have mild to severe allergic reactions to the bites. These bites can also lead to secondary infections of the skin. Bed bugs may also affect the mental health of people living in infested homes. The reported effects include anxiety, insomnia and systemic reactions."
While the Kid Care application and the one being developed to target bed bug problems show the potential of smart phones, not everybody is convinced that all medical and public health material being developed is necessarily useful.
Jenn Riggle, who writes for Hospital Impact, one of the top 50 health-care blogs, noted earlier this month that hospitals seem to be unveiling new mobile applications weekly. She questions the value of some of them.
"It's important to keep in mind that while there are thousands of iPhone apps available, only 5 percent are still used one month after downloading," she wrote.
Officials at Children's says its Kid Care app has been downloaded by more than 16,000 people. It does not track how frequently the information is accessed.
Funding for the Beacon's health reporting is provided in part by the Missouri Foundation for Health, a philanthropic organization that aims to improve the health of the people in the communities it serves.
