Personal health systems - Opportunities and barriers for adoption

Increasing prevalence of lifestyle-related health risks and chronic diseases, coupled with limited resources in the healthcare system, calls for citizen-centric health promotion and disease prevention measures as well as new care models for management of chronic diseases. As a future scenario emphasis of the health care should gradually shift from treating and managing of diseases to their prevention and early interventions. The risk of chronic diseases begins to rise and physical capacity begins to decline after the age of 30. Therefore, working-age citizens are an important target group for health promotion and early interventions. Personal Health Systems (PHS) may be used for supporting psychological therapies, self-management of chronic diseases, and behavioral change. Especially Web-based programs have been successfully utilized for facilitating self-monitoring, distribution of information, and communications between clients and healthcare professionals. More recently, the focus has started to turn towards mobile devices and health monitoring tools. By combing different technologies into a comprehensive toolbox of methods for health management, providing the citizen freedom to choose which of them to use, and offering him a specifically designed technology supported intervention program, has proved as a successful strategy. In this presentation, some of these results are reviewed.