According to an announcement from the American Heart and Stroke Associations, more than a third of stroke patients do not get to the hospital by ambulance, even though it is the fastest way to arrive.

The information comes from recent research in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, an American Heart Association journal.

Fittingly, the American Stroke Association, American Heart Association, and Ad Council are touting the formal launch of Spot a Stroke F.A.S.T. — a new mobile app designed to help users recognize the warning signs of a stroke.

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This week, the team behind Mood Watch – a mobile app that aims to empower people with mood disorders to live happier and more productive lives – announced the launch of its “Mental Health is For Everyone” initiative.

In the process, Mood Watch confirmed the upcoming availability of the app in 10 new languages by May 9, 2013. The languages include Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Macedonian, Spanish, Ukrainian and Chinese.

Currently available in English, Mood Watch runs $0.99 in the App Store and Google Play Store.

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Today at the HIMSS 2013 conference and exhibition in New Orleans, the team at Wolters Kluwer Health confirmed the launch of UpToDate Anywhere.

The system, they say, will enable healthcare enterprises to improve patient care by equipping clinicians with 24/7 mobile access to comprehensive, evidence-based, clinical decision support through the UpToDate mobile app.

“As doctors and healthcare enterprises embrace mobile health initiatives and increasingly adopt devices…as clinical tools,” the company stated, “they can now get actionable answers to point-of-care questions on-site, at satellite offices, at home or on the go by using the UpToDate mobile app.”

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This week, Heritage Provider Network, The University of California Los Angeles, and Open mHealth announced the launch of a $100,000 mobile apps health prize challenge.

The latest in a recent string of high profile open competitions to mHealth tech developers and entrepreneurs, The Heritage Open mHealth challenge similarly encourages teams to create mobile applications using the Open mHealth architecture.

UCLA’s involvement stems from its professed dedication to mobile health.

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Kaiser Permanente has announced the launch of its latest mobile initiative — a full featured “Health Management” app for iOS.

Like its other mobile offerings, the new app allows members to access many of the same tools already available via its “My Health Manager” tool on kp.org.  Members can email their providers, check lab test results, order prescription refills, manage appointments and more — all from their iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches.  This latest move comes on the heals of Kaiser making the largest electronic health record system in the world accessible via smartphones with the launch of its mobile-optimized website m.kp.org.

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Walgreens today announced that it’s added two new features to its iOS and Android-based mobile applications, including a new Pill Reminder feature and the ability to “Transfer by Scan.”

The latter enables users on iPhone and Android devices to transfer a prescription from another pharmacy to Walgreens by taking a picture of their prescription bottle and providing their name, date of birth and phone number, then sending to Walgreens with one click.  The new Pill Reminder feature allows iPhone mobile app users to track medication schedules and receive alerts through nine different reminder options, which can be set up by scanning a prescription barcode and selecting alert preferences.  Users also can add multiple prescriptions, vitamins and other supplements to a single reminder notification.

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As healthcare organizations enter the mobile space there’s been debate over whether native mobile applications or mobile Web development is the better choice.  While each have their pros and cons, most organizations have chosen the former.  It was announced today, however, that Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina (BCBSNC) is launching a mobile-optimized version of its Member Services site.

Supported on both Android and iOS platforms, BCBSNC wanted to give its more than 3.7M customers access to its award-winning site without the need for downloading a native mobile application.  Developed with the help of Kony Solutions, users can securely login to bcbsnc.com on their mobile devices to access features such as claim viewing, current health plan benefit information, physician finder, treatment cost estimator, prescription drug information and much more.

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