Mobile Health Apps: Track Your Health from Anywhere!

Every time you walk into a health provider’s office lately, you are handed a clipboard with a ream of paper attached asking for every detail of your medical history. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, the office will mail it ahead so you can start early on it, or even try to look some of the dates up in your records. Let’s face it. Once we’ve had a surgery or an immunization, or a medication change, we move forward to recovery or whatever comes next. It’s tough to remember details.

This is where a mobile personal health record comes in. There are tons of PHRs out there, but some are designed to be mobile. Whether web-based, USB, or on a cell phone or other mobile device, your medical information is right there, in its entirety so you don’t have to try to start from scratch trying to remember when you had that tetanus shot or tonsillectomy.

Capzule PHR, is an all-inclusive mobile app for iPhone and iPad that includes tons of options. Capzule PHR is comprehensive and includes the ability to enter all personal profile information, conditions, allergies, immunizations, family history, medical history, and social history. Users can add medications, including discontinued meds. Graphs of vital signs and flowsheets for PMP, CBC, lipid panels, and thyroid tests are included. Self-monitoring of blood glucose is also tracked and users can define their own flowsheets or self-screening templates. Areas for notes, results/procedures, and attachments via upload, photo album, or saved photo are offered. Appointment tracking with reminders is also offered. This mobile PHR actually has more features than are listed here, including the ability to email backup and export in CSV for printing. This is one of the most all-inclusive mobile PHR apps out there, and the lite version has all of those options for free.

Another all-purpose PHR includes Cloud PHR, a mobile app that is integrated with Google Health. With an Internet connection, you keep your PHR info in the cloud, obtainable with Wi-Fi service. The Pro version allows users to cache files for use in health providers’ offices without an Internet connection. The Google Health Record can be edited directly from the iPhone. As with Google Health, obviously Cloud PHR is complete and has very comprehensive records.



My Health Records - Health n family is a PHR designed to track the health and medical information of a family. It contains a medical summary, history, reports, medications, appointment tracker, allergies, immunizations, and more for more than one individual user. While not as highly rated as Capzule or Cloud, with some tweaks and a lower price tag, it might be just as useful.

While PHRs are generally geared to providing in-depth information, there are hundreds of “trackers”, or mini-PHRs out there that track weight, blood pressure, and other elements of health. These are more limited and, in the long run, less helpful than a fully functioning mobile PHR.

For example, in the event of an accident, emergency personnel may appreciate knowing when your last asthma attack was, but they would be able to respond more quickly and accurately to your immediate needs if they knew your allergies, other health issues, medications, past medical history, and current conditions.

While the focused mini-PHR trackers are helpful, nothing can beat a full mobile PHR for providing a doctor, first responder, or even a family member with a full medical picture of your health and health history.

Some mobile PHR apps are designed to monitor certain health and medical conditions. One such app is CareCheck. This particular app only tracks breast cancer, heart attack, lung cancer, pregnancy, and birth, so if you are not affected by one of those conditions, this app will not do you much good. This is an interesting amalgamation of conditions and this strange combination will likely affect the number of downloads of the app.

Let’s look at a few more mobile mini-PHR apps. For people trying to have a baby, a fertility tracking PHR can really help organize and maintain information necessary for the couple and for the doctor. Pink Pad Pro tracks, periods, moods, symptoms, fertility and ovulation with calendar sync. Similarly, Days is an ovulation calendar to track symptoms and chart fertility. iPeriod Ultimate tracks periods, symptoms, moods, weight, and has customized designs. It offers breast exam reminders and even alerts the user when her period is expected.



Other apps track health issues such as diabetes. Tracking diabetes is really a perfect example of a useful mobile health application. People with diabetes regularly need to check blood sugar values. They need to see how certain foods, activities, and medication dosages affect them. By tracking them electronically, on a mobile device, their healthcare providers can then assess the patient’s health more accurately and recommend treatment. An app like Glucose Buddy records time of day, notes, blood glucose value, meds, food, activity, and A1C. It graphs results for easy viewing. Taking these details to the doctor will help him to establish appropriate treatment. Similar apps, such as Diabetes Buddy also track glucose, but with more capability, such as a food database with nutrition information and even water intake. This would be VERY valuable to a diabetic as the person could relate dietary intake to blood sugar values.



Migraines are awful and sometimes difficult to diagnose and treat. One PHR, iManage Migraine assists patients with identifying triggers, journaling each migraine, and providing analysis to help doctors create action plans and determine treatments. Having this information at a patients fingertips prevents vague answers and relying on memory. Ubiqi Health Migraine Tracker also tracks when you get a migraine, the severity, treatment, possible triggers, and notes.

Asthma is another disorder that works well with a mobile PHR. Asthma Tracker logs peak flow, inhaler use, and graphs data which can be exported in CSV or text for health providers.

In other words, mobile PHRs come in two distinct varieties. One type is a full, thorough PHR that provides a complete health and medical picture of an individual. It includes all of their health and wellness information as well as medical issues. These types of apps are very useful in mobile form as they can be taken to appointments with healthcare providers or be available in the event of an emergency. The second variety is the mini-PHR, or tracker. These are condition-based. They contain vital information that is related to a specific disorder or set of disorders. The information is important, but does not provide a full medical picture of the patient. The investment of time and money in a mobile PHR is well spent… and a combination of a full PHR and one for a specific condition may more fully satisfy the needs of some individuals. For some, one comprehensive PHR will be plenty.