Reportlinker.Com Adds mHealth And Home Monitoring - 4th Edition to its Catalogue

Reportlinker.com, a search engine offering an access to the largest online collection of industry, company and country reports, announced the availability of a new market research report, entitled mHealth and Home Monitoring - 4th Edition.

The concept of mHealth has evolved out of the broad concept of e-health, which includes a plethora of electronic processes and communication. mHealth, which has emerged as branch of eHealth, uses a broad range of mobile health related communication, application or data service.

The said report covers home health monitoring involving patient self-testing using medical devices and remote transmission of the medical data to healthcare providers for disease management.

The report pointed out that the treatment of a number of chronic medical conditions requires daily monitoring. These conditions include chronic diseases including cardiac arrhythmia, hypertension, ischemic diseases, sleep apnea, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) among the others. According to the report, home monitoring can become a treatment option in such conditions and can lead to significant cost saving.

According to the industry experts, with the application of information and communication technologies in the healthcare industry, the patients can enjoy more efficient care delivery.

The new research however points out that the rate of adoption is still slow and wireless technologies have only just begun to penetrate the market. At the end of 2011, around 2.2 million patients worldwide were using a home monitoring service based on equipment with integrated connectivity.

The figure is exclusive of monitoring devices connected to a PC or mobile phone. It only includes systems that rely on monitors with integrated connectivity or systems that use monitoring hubs with integrated cellular or fixed-line modems.

Berg Insight forecasts that the number of home monitoring systems with integrated communication capabilities will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.0 percent between 2010 and 2016 to reach 4.9 million connections globally by the end of the forecast period.

Among the companies that have developed integrated solutions for monitoring multiple chronic diseases and other conditions include such industry leaders as Bosch, Honeywell, Philips and Bayer. Small specialist telehealth companies like Cardiocom and Numera are also not far behind. Combined, these six companies account for 73.0 percent of the installed base of telehealth hubs. The main market segments for medical devices with integrated connectivity are cardiac rhythm management, sleep therapy and cardiac event monitoring.

The chief marketers of these wirelessly connected integrated solutions are Medtronic, Biotronik, St. Jude Medical, CardioNet, LifeWatch, ResMed, Philips Respironics and Fisher & Paykel Healthcare. The major mobile operator groups including AT&T, Orange, Telefonica and Vodafone are currently exploring the field and have set up business units dedicated to mHealth.

The research pointed toward an interesting trend, where the mHealth and eHealth solution vendors are forging strategic alliances with the mobile operators for the expansion of their businesses.

The research revealed that several factors have contributed toward the increased adoption of out-of-hospital wireless monitoring in healthcare. Major among them are changes in demographics and technology development as well as new advancements in medical treatment.

At the same time, there are a number of barriers, including resistance to change among healthcare organizations and clinicians, misaligned incentive structures and the financing of wireless solutions by what is at large an underfunded healthcare sector.

Earlier Reportlinker.com announced the availability of another telehealth market report in its catalogue, entitled Tele-Health Monitoring: Market Shares, Strategies, and Forecasts, Worldwide, 2011 to 2017.