New research out from Research2Guidance is projecting the market for mobile health apps to more than double during 2012 to top off at more than $1.3B, up from $718M in 2011.

The healthy increase projected for this year is attributed to five main areas according to the research firm’s latest report, including app downloads, in-app advertisements, mHealth services, direct transactions and sensor sales. The latter being a substantial growth driver as a number of big healthcare companies published mHealth apps in 2011 that go far beyond the simple nature of most apps we’ve seen hit the market so far.

The report also notes that in 2012 the number of mHealth application users – mobile users who downloaded a smartphone mHealth application at least once – will reach 247 million.  This is nearly double the 124 million users who downloaded mHealth smarthphone applications in 2011.

The full report is available for download here.

MMRGlobal, the company behind MyMedicalRecords.com, announced today that it plans to debut new smartphone and tablet applications at the 2012 HIMSS conference in Las Vegas February 20-24.

The new apps being showcased are its MyMedicalRecords Personal Health Record (PHR) and Emergency View Portal applications, which both work across smartphones and tablets running Android.  Last week we covered the launch of the MyMedicalRecords prepaid PHR card that was introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show, which features what the company calls a “Lifeline telephone number.”   In the case of the prepaid PHR service, these Lifeline numbers are used to allow one’s physicians to send in health records and other information which are then centralized in a single PHR.

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A new partnership was announced today between Verizon and Duke University with the intention of sharing resources to develop mobile health applications and promote consumer health education.

The primary focus for the new partnership is to develop health information technology initiatives to drive better care, expanded access and lower costs for both sides of the healthcare ecosystem — healthcare organizations and consumers alike.  ”Verizon Connected Healthcare Solutions,” the company’s health care practice group, and Duke will combine technical resources and personnel to focus on projects that leverage the inherent value of advanced communications technologies in the healthcare space.

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Following the acquisition of MedFusion over a year ago, Intuit has debuted its new mHealth-focused division aptly named “Intuit Health.”  As such, the company has announced its first two mobile applications geared towards the mHealth market.

The first of which, a smartphone application called “Mobile Inbox,” allows access for the over 4 million users of Intuit Health’s Patient Portal to communicate better with their physicians while on the go.  The app allows members to schedule appointments, retrieve lab results or pay their co-pay among other things.  The app is expected to be available in mid 2012.

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Though mHealth adoption hasn’t grown as quickly as many had hoped, there’s still certain demographics that are driving the market, according to new data out from the Pew Internet and American Life Project.

According to the research, it was found that more men use apps to track their health than women, though only by a percentage point.  It was also found that Black and Hispanic consumers, those who lived in urban areas, and adults ages 18 to 29 also showed higher-than-average use of the mobile Web and apps for healthcare.  Further drilling down the demographics, it was found that those with an income of $75K+ are most likely to utilize mHealth apps and services, while those with “some college education” are most likely as well.

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We’ve talked a lot recently about what AT&T is doing in the mHealth space, but it looks like Verizon isn’t wasting any time either.  At the recent Verizon Developers Conference in Las Vegas, the nation’s largest wireless operator debuted a new mobile HD video conferencing tool for businesses — a tool aimed squarely at the mHealth market.

The tool, which includes an app called FuzeMeeting, allows users the ability to start multi-party HD video conferences from their smartphones and tablets.  The solution also allows you to collaborate with documents, video and images face-to-face while leveraging the speed of Verizon’s 4G LTE data network.   While the solution is applicable in a wide range of industries, healthcare comes to mind as the most prominent.  Medical staff can remotely access patient X-Rays, obtain live video consultation with doctors and instantly collaborate with a pool of experts through video conferencing, among many other use cases.

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The American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) is weighing in on draft guidelines published by the FDA for review of what mobile medical apps should be regulated by the government.

It’s the opinion of the AMIA that there’s a big difference between an app that’s motivated by an “electronic response” and one that’s triggered by an actual human being, which should be taken into account before the FDA makes its final decisions.  The central issue is the classification of Clinical Decision Support (CDS) apps, in which the AMIA says more attention should be given to apps that provide CDS in an automatic and autonomous  fashion, and which intervene directly based on patient care data.

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