Challenges of Mobile Health Applications in Developing Countries - E-Healthcare Systems and Wireless Communications - page 22

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support to patients who require it the most.
There are legal challenges in realizing the
full potential of mHealth applications as well.
Legislation is not as streamlined in the develop-
ing world. Even in the developed world, legisla-
tion to bring change to health services has taken
many years, and is a continually ongoing process.
Such processes may be stalled indefinitely in the
developing world. Legal hurdles, e.g., protecting
the privacy of health records and having standards
in place for their access may take many years to
resolve. However, significant progress has been
made in protecting records in the developed world
and similar policies could be implemented in the
developing world.
In general, the advantages of realizing mHealth
solutions make it promising to look at facing these
challenges and coming up with solutions to resolve
them with minimum resistance. Improved health
care monitoring can go a long way in assisting
patients with chronic disease, thereby improv-
ing their lifestyle. It can also cut down costs for
populations who have poor access to hospitals and
it is a challenge to reach such health care provid-
ers. Being able to monitor your own health, get
real-time feedback based on this monitoring over
a mobile phone (application), is a great way to
cut down on travel and diagnosis costs for poor
populations who cannot afford these services.
Communicable diseases can also be tracked and
stopped from spreading once diagnosed using
mHealth applications. Though the challenges are
significant, the benefits gained from the deploy-
ment of Mobile Health applications far outweigh
them. By allocating sizable budgets to realize the
infrastructure, training, and technical expertise
for these applications, their positive impacts
can definitely go a long way in alleviating the
suffering of people with chronic diseases while
also improving the lifestyle of countless others.
Anyone with access to a mobile phone, which is
becoming more and more commonplace in today's
world, stands to benefit.

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