These days, the number of apps aimed at health and wellness can be overwhelming. Sifting through the apps can take a great deal of time, and finding the right ones for individual needs can take even longer. It seems to the average mobile user that there are countless apps, but it’s not your imagination—there really are. According to a recent statement from Cigna, there are over 40,000 mobile health apps.
Recognizing this, Cigna, a global health service company, teamed up with SocialWellth to co-create “a selective and curated” marketplace, Go You Cigna Marketplace, which the companies promise “cuts through the clutter of mobile health apps.”
Joan Kennedy, the senior vice president of consumer health engagement at Cigna, sympathizes with consumers: “When it comes to choosing the best health and fitness app, 40,000 choices is no real choice at all.” She says that the new marketplace is “designed to meet each individual where they are” and to offer each customer a “wonderfully specific and engaging starting point for their fantastic journey to improved health and achieving their potential.”
At this time, there is very little information available on where consumers will be able to take advantage of this marketplace and just how it will work. The companies are announcing the initiative at the Seventh Annual Health 2.0 Fall Conference, after which time, more information should become available.
What is known is that the companies will be using behavioral psychologists, information architects, and other subject matter experts. Quick polls, they say, will help them gain insight and “ultimately drive a hyper-personalized experience.” Kennedy says that the marketplace will be certifying health improvement apps that their customers tell them meet three criteria: those that “work for them, that they can stick to, and get the results they want.” Soon, finding health improvement apps will be a much easier process.
Edited by
Alisen Downey
