Khatun Fatema, Hanifi S M A, Iqbal Mohammad, Rasheed Sabrina, Rahman M Shafiqur, Ahmed Tanvir, Hoque Shahidul, Sharmin Tamanna, Khan Nazib Uz Zaman, Mahmood Shehrin Shaila, Peters David H, Bhuiya Abbas
International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b), 68 Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Sarani, Mohakhali, Dhaka-1212, Bangladesh; School of Public Health and Community Medicine, The University of New South Wales, Kensington, New South Wales 2052, Australia; Asia-Pacific ubiquitous Healthcare Research Centre, School of Information Systems, Technology and Management, Australian School of Business, The University of New South Wales, Kensington, New South Wales 2052, Australia.
International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b), 68 Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Sarani, Mohakhali, Dhaka-1212, Bangladesh.
PLoS One. 2014 Nov 6;9(11):e111413. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0111413. eCollection 2014.
Bangladesh has a serious shortage of qualified health workforce. The limited numbers of trained service providers are based in urban areas, which limits access to quality healthcare for the rural population. mHealth provides a new opportunity to ensure access to quality services to the population. A recent review suggested that there are 19 mHealth initiatives in the country. This paper reports findings on people's knowledge, perception, use, cost and compliance with advice received from mHealth services from a study carried out during 2012-13 in Chakaria, a rural sub-district in Bangladesh.
A total of 4,915 randomly-chosen respondents aged 18 years and above were interviewed.
Household ownership of mobile phones in the study area has increased from 2% in 2004 to 81% in 2012; 45% of the respondents reported that they had mobile phones. Thirty-one percent of the respondents were aware of the use of mobile phones for healthcare. Very few people were aware of the available mHealth services. Males, younger age group, better educated, and those from richer households were more knowledgeable about the existing mHealth services. Among the respondents who sought healthcare in the preceding two weeks of the survey, only 2% used mobile phones for healthcare. Adherence to the advice from the healthcare providers in terms of purchasing and taking the drugs was somewhat similar between the patients who used mobile phone for consultation versus making a physical visit.
The high penetration of mobile phones into the society provides a unique opportunity to use the mHealth technology for consulting healthcare providers. Although knowledge of the existence of mHealth services was low, it was encouraging that the compliance with the prescriptions was almost similar for advice received through mobile phone and physical visits. The study revealed clear indications that society is looking forward to embracing the mHealth technology.
孟加拉国合格卫生人力严重短缺。经过培训的服务提供者数量有限，且集中在城市地区，这限制了农村人口获得优质医疗保健服务的机会。移动医疗为确保民众获得优质服务提供了新机遇。最近一项综述表明，该国共有19项移动医疗倡议。本文报告了2012年至2013年期间在孟加拉国一个农村分区查卡里亚开展的一项研究中，关于人们对移动医疗服务的知识、认知、使用情况、成本以及对所获建议的遵从情况的研究结果。
共对4915名随机选取的18岁及以上受访者进行了访谈。
研究区域内家庭手机拥有率从2004年的2%增至2012年的81%；45%的受访者表示他们拥有手机。31%的受访者知晓使用手机进行医疗保健。知晓现有移动医疗服务的人很少。男性、较年轻年龄组、受教育程度较高者以及来自较富裕家庭的人对现有移动医疗服务了解更多。在调查前两周寻求过医疗保健服务的受访者中，只有2%使用手机进行医疗保健。在购买和服药方面，使用手机咨询的患者与亲自就诊的患者对医疗服务提供者建议 的遵从情况大致相似。
手机在社会中的高普及率为利用移动医疗技术咨询医疗服务提供者提供了独特机遇。尽管对移动医疗服务存在情况的知晓率较低，但令人鼓舞的是，通过手机获得的建议与亲自就诊获得的建议在处方遵从方面几乎相似。该研究明确表明，社会期待接受移动医疗技术。
