With HealthKit engaging Patients (30+ million in the UK could use it today with their NHS GP) and ever more Healthcare Professionals signing up for accredited mHealth training I don’t think it be long for the tide to turn.
Doctors all have someone they can call when they need to ask medical advice (normally a work colleague or someone they went to college with) and the bosses of big healthcare firms have had this for years (2012) but with 64% of US adults having a smartphone (as of Oct 2014) I’m confident that soon we’ll be seeing Primary Care Physicians demanding that their Patients interact with them using their smartphones in between those increasingly redundant rushed office visits.
HatTip (for the original ‘you can’t list your iPhone as your primary care physician’ cartoon): Eric Topol