mHealth Working Group Meeting Notes

Wednesday, May 12th 2010, 9:00 AM – 11:30AM (Eastern US)

Held at ARHP, Washington D.C

A big thanks to those that participated in the May 12th meeting of the mHealth Working Group. We discussed a guest presentation and the topic of mLearning. We also introduced a knowledge management toolkit for the Working Group’s resources.

The mHealth Toolkit was introduced as an online knowledge management platform for resources of the mHealth Working Group. The Toolkit is electronic reference library to organize and disseminate the knowledge shared at our meetings. Participants in the mHealth Working Group are invited to use and steer development of the mHealth Toolkit before its release. Modifications have been made to the Toolkit and your feedback is invited by June 8. Please include your comments on the site or contact me at . If you are a current member of the mHealth Working Group, you can access the mHealth Toolkit at its launch. Simply login with your email address as login ID and the password “changeme”, then look for the mHealth Toolkit at the bottom of your account page. You can then add resources and comment on them by following the attached instructions.Organizations are invited to submit their own materials for selection in the mHealth Toolkit, so that their logos will be included in the public version of the Toolkit. Looking ahead to the coming public release of the mHealth Toolkit, this is an opportunity for the Working Group participants to support the appropriate adoption of mHealth throughout the developing world.

A presentation on Text4Health immunization reminders was given by Dr. Melissa Stockwell, an Assistant Professor of Clinical Pediatrics and Population and Family Health at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Mailman School of Public Health. Dr. Stockwell discussed study of text reminders to improve adolescent immunization coverage. The study addressed a US Latino population, but addressed many universal issues such as language selection and cost effectiveness. See the attached slide for lessons learned in the Text4Health study. The full presentation cannot be disseminated while the study is in review for publication, but Dr. Stockwell is available to answer questions at .

The Gates Foundation’s Grand Challenges Explorations was discussed at the meeting, and participants were encouraged to apply by May 19 for the grantto create low-cost cell phone-based applications for priority global health conditions. Participants commented on the difference between “best innovations” and “best, new innovations”, and well as the difference between innovations emphasizing health and those emphasizing information technology. The importance of interoperability was raised. Participants also questioned the definition of “low end” cell phones, such as whether Java-enable phones would be permissible. Comments framed the Grand Challenges Explorations as an opportunity to apply crossover applications for health programs, such as mBanking. The Grand Challenge was also mentioned as an opportunity for a collaborative joint proposal.

mLearning was discussed as an mHealth area for new consideration by the Working Group. For the purposes of discussion, mLearning was defined as use of mobile technology to train health care providers- building the capacity of the provider rather than emphasizing of the capacity of the device or of remote experts, as with job aids or telemedicine (see attached slides). Participants reiterated that job aids and telemedicine might also be useful for training, but that learning only occurs if it is not merely rote dependence on the device. The precedence set by eLearning was addressed, but discussion emphasized the importance of not merely “cutting and pasting” trainings from another format into mobile devices. mLearning has different challenges and opportunities. The advantages and limitations of mLearning in reviewed literature was summarized. There was also discussion of the difference between self-directed learning vs. preset formats, and synchronous vs. asynchronous uses. The question was raised whether mLearning applications should be divided by type of device.

We are creating a technical group on mLearning. If you are interested in joining the subgroup to plan future efforts in mLearning, please express your interest . You are also welcome to invite colleagues to receive the general announcements of the mHealth Working Group.

We appreciate the meeting space provided by the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals. They welcome feedback on their new initiative to provide an interactive maternal health mapping tool (see attachment).

For those of you that have not seen the announcement of the next mHealth Summit, see

May 12, 2010 Meeting Attendees In-Person

Name: / Organization: / E-mail:
Miguel Lara / Microhealth /
James Bontempo / Jhpiego /
Aleya Horn Kennedy / ARHP /
Katie Powell / MSH /
Michael Rodriguez / JSI /
Megan Noel / JSI /
David Isaak / Six Blue Data /
Robert Weierbach / mHealth Alliance /
Beth Robbins / ARHP /
Mitali Thakor / Johns Hopkins SPH/ MIT /
Luis Tam / Plan USA /
Laura Raney / FHI /
Meredith Puleio / IRH/Georgetown /
Hillary Chen / OSTP /
Ann Hendrix-Jenkins / Core Group /
Jeanne Koepsell / Save the Children /
Peggy D’Adamo / USAID /
Philippe Lemay / K4Health /
Adam Slote / USAID /