I usually save most of my mHealth specific blogging for my Smart Phone Healthcare blog (subscribe to it if you haven’t already), but this story was too interesting to not share with a larger audience. This story comes from Gerald Theis of MCR Global. Gerald is one of the most patient people you’ll meet in the mhealth space. He’s working across international lines, but this story is where I love seeing Gerald’s work the most. It’s also a great illustration of the power of mHealth.
Last week a patient started to self mutilate (multiple cuts to legs). Her daily severity scores were consistently high (3 = severe). The MCR SMS message Alert was sent to her primary caregiver who made a health check home visit followed by a psychotherapy visit within 24 hours.
This mobile health program helped to engage the primary caregiver and may have averted a hospitalization. The patient was able to use her support system and crisis management psychotherapy session to utilize coping strategies to deal with her internal conflicts and has not harmed herself since the session.
This testimonial demonstrates how we can achieve patient and caregiver engagement via mobile health technology and avoid unnecessary hospitalization.
EMPOWERMENT. All 15 patients are very satisfied with this unique program and are tracking their scores consistently. This self report program is helping them identify triggers and early warning signs as they score each symptom for severity – Mild-Moderate or Severe. Each are shown their graph results that provide a visual way to see their pattern of distress. One asked for an appointment sooner than scheduled because her symptoms were escalating. All like the SMS feature that makes them feel secure.
