Digital home health and mHealth: Prospects and challenges for adoption in the U.S

The burgeoning costs of healthcare and growth in consumer use of the Internet to attain health-related information to better manage their health-care, coupled with demographic changes in the industrialized countries, strongly argues for the use of tele-health applications that can lower costs and improve the quality of healthcare delivery. Despite its potential, telehealth and digital home-health, has not progressed as rapidly as anticipated, and there are very few deployments to date. Much discussion has focused on the technology challenges associated with mobile healthcare. This paper however also explores the social, regulatory, and market forces that will affect adoption of mobile telehealth. Using the VISOR business model framework, we examine the value proposition of telehealth and adoption factors. We find that while the value proposition for mobile healthcare is substantial, significant obstacles in the organizational structures and service platforms exist which must be addressed to accelerate adoption in the U.S.