For many of us app developers, the world of mHealth apps still do not seem real. mHealth or Mobile Health is one of the newly sprouting arenas as far the health and technology relativity is considered. This method is a way of making and maintaining human health by virtue of mobile phone applications through different app markets like android, iOS, Symbian, Blackberry etc. As far as the statistics are concerned, the use of these health apps is on a surge lately. In both the developed and the developing countries, these have proved to be a boon for people who are looking for quick aid and for those who don’t have time to visit a doc!
- The Boom: Good news for the application entrepreneurs is that there has been a huge increase in the number of total downloads of the health applications over a couple of years. Almost a 2 fold increase in the same has been recorded worldwide. To be statistically precise, the health application downloads in the year 2011 were 127 million over the globed. This number has rocketed up to 247 million in just 10 months i.e. till October 2012. These include the stats of both Android and iOS users and it clearly shows the consciousness of the people regarding their health. This number is expected to grow as every day; there are more than 1 million new Android devices which get activated!
- The Variety: Currently, the number of health application available on the markets is colossal. The customers have a large number of options to choose from. Today, there are about 29,000 health applications over different markets of different operating systems which are enjoyed by the people on their tablets and smart phones. As far as the age group classification is concerned, 29% of the downloads are done by the age group of 18-29 years, 18% are done by that of 30-49 years, 8% by 50-64 years of age and those above 65 years of age have downloaded 7% of the applications. It is clearly visible with these statistics that younger people have a larger tendency to be health conscious over the globe.
- The Price: One of the main reasons of the large number of the above figures is health consciousness. Another reason of the same is that these apps are either totally free of cost, or they charge a meager amount which is way less than a doctor’s fee. To be precise, 90% of these apps are free and the rest 10% charge less than $3 as price. The application entrepreneurs would be happy to know the market of these mHealth apps did a business of $1.2 billion in 2011 which boomed up to $11.2 billion in 2012! 60% of the downloaded applications are those of exercises and which help in the weight loss.
Though a relatively new concept, the mHealth way of diagnosis has turned out to be a very important and profitable business opportunity for all the application developers around. Most importantly, it is expected to rise even higher in the long run with further advancements in science and technology.
