FATIMA A. TORRADO
Bachelor of Science of Pharmacy
Mariano Marcos State University
Batac City
+639092434872
Fatimatorrado_05@yahoo.com
ABSTRACT
Mobile devices ( smartphones, tablet computers) have become ubiquitous and subsequently there has been a growth in mobile applications (apps). Concurrently, mobile devices have been integrated into health care practice due to the availability and quality of medical apps. These mobile medical apps offer increased access to clinical references and point-of-care tools. However, there has been little identification of mobile medical apps suitable for the practice of pharmacy. Pharmacists regularly provide health-related education to patients. The type of education varies from patient to patient and can include information such as drug indication, mechanism of action and purpose of therapy, drug interactions, side effects, proper administration, and disease-specific information. Pharmacists face a number of challenges in providing adequate health-related education to their patients. Information should be tailored to each patient. Topics can be complex and often require continual reinforcement. Appropriate time to devote to health-related education and resources available may be lacking. Despite these challenges, health-related education provided by a pharmacist has been proven to improve health outcomes. Mobile apps may help alleviate some challenges and provide a new method for pharmacists to provide health-related education. There is limited published information evaluating the utilization of mobile apps as educational tools for patients. Furthermore, desirable features and patient needs for health-related education via mobile technology remain largely unknown.
INTRODUCTION
This study aims to study the use of a mobile app for patient education to (1) quantify patient interest, (2) determine desirable features and (3) determine if a relationship exists between patient variables and interest
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