Telehealth Monitor

Popular medical blogger Dr. Kevin Pho, also known as KevinMD, has a noteworthy post on the growing popularity of smartphone use in hospitals and smartphones’ “inevitable” displacement of pagers. A recent study by Manhattan Research found that 64 percent of doctors use smartphones like BlackBerrys or iPhones. Each of those platforms support mobile applications that provide pager functionalities.

BlackBerry partner Wallace Wireless offers a pager service called WIC Pager. Wallace points out that since many healthcare workers already carry a smartphone, “a single device solution reduces the costs and resources necessary to manage the traditional pager and cellphone combination.” WIC Pager can leverage cellular networks as well as in-building WiFi. It also “allows for quick responses by implementing a one-click call back feature,” which trumps legacy pagers one-way flow. The service also offers “real-time reporting on all pager alerts” so administrators can keep track of messages, too.

via Prediction: Smartphones to replace pagers in hospitals | mobihealthnews.