By CLICK Staff
NEW YORK—One in three cell phone owners (31 percent) have used their phone to look for health information. In a comparable, national survey conducted two years ago, 17 percent of cell phone owners had used their phones to look for health advice.
Smartphone owners lead this activity. Half of smartphone owners use their devices to get health information — 52 percent gather health information on their phones, compared with 6 percent of non-smartphone owners. Cell phone owners who are Latino, African American, between the ages of 18-49, or hold a college degree are also more likely to gather health information this way.
In fact, according to a just-released (Nov. 8)
Mobile Health survey conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project one fifth of smartphone users have a health app. Smartphones enable the use of mobile software applications to help people track or manage their health. Some 19 percent of smartphone owners have at least one health app on their phone. Exercise, diet, and weight apps are the most popular types.
Among the health apps downloaded to smartphones:
Further, text alerts about health issues are a small proportion of all texts received on smartphones, but this is projected to grow. A whopping 80 percent of cell phone owners say they send and receive text messages, but just 9 percent of cell phone owners say they receive any text updates or alerts about health or medical issues. Women, those between the ages of 30 and 64, and smartphone owners, the Pew survey reports, are more likely than other cell phone owners to have signed up for health text alerts.
The Pew Internet & American Life Project is an initiative of the Pew Research Center, a nonprofit "fact tank" that provides information on the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world.
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