The advent of telemedicine has allowed physicians to deliver medical treatment to patients from a distance. Mobile apps such as WhatsApp Messenger, an instant messaging service, came as a novel concept in all fields of social life, including medicine. The use of instant messaging services has been shown to improve communication within medical teams by providing means for quick teleconsultation, information sharing, and starting treatment as soon as possible.
Telemedicine is defined as the use of electronic information and communication technologies to provide health care support when distance separates the client (the patient or health care worker) from the health care professional with expertise in the relevant field The information transmitted between the two parties can take many forms including data and text, audio, still images, and video
The use of mobile technologies in general and mobile phone specifically, is a rapidly expanding field within telemedicine Audiovisual communication in health care aided by smartphone apps is a novel concept that is rapidly gaining ground in all areas of medicine A nationwide survey performed in the United States in 2011 included 3306 medical providers and found that more than half used various apps in their clinical practice, some of which had not been specifically developed for medical purposes
Although scientific studies on the use of WhatsApp Messenger remain scarce in the medical literature, increasing numbers of health professionals have adopted it as a communication interface and for the exchange of images and videos Its use does not seem to reduce image quality in the conversion from analog to digital formats, thus providing the ability to identify sufficient details for an adequate diagnosis and initial treatment with better efficacy than other modalities used for the same purposes
The aim of this study was to perform a comprehensive systematic review of current literature on the use of the WhatsApp Messenger mobile app as an adjunctive health care tool, as there is some evidence that this app can be an effective, safe, and economical telemedicine tool for professionals from all fields of health care (nurses, psychologists, dentists, physical therapists, and physical and sports educators, among others).
Objective: The aim of this study was to perform a comprehensive systematic review of present literature on the use of the WhatsApp Messenger app as an adjunctive health care tool for medical doctors.
Methods: Searches were performed in PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library using the term “whatsapp*” in articles published before January 2016. A bibliography of all relevant original articles that used the WhatsApp Messenger app was created. The level of evidence of each study was determined according to the Oxford Levels of Evidence ranking system produced by the Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine. The impact and the indications of WhatsApp Messenger are discussed in order to understand the extent to which this app currently functions as an adjunctive tool for telemedicine.
Results: The database search identified a total of 30 studies in which the term “whatsapp*” was used. Each article’s list of references was evaluated item-by-item. After literature reviews, letters to the editor, and low-quality studies were excluded, a total of 10 studies were found to be eligible for inclusion. Of these studies, 9 had been published in the English language and 1 had been published in Spanish. Five were published by medical doctors.
Conclusions: The pooled data presents compelling evidence that the WhatsApp Messenger app is a promising system, whether used as a communication tool between health care professionals, as a means of communication between health care professionals and the general public, or as a learning tool for providing health care information to professionals or to the general population. However, high-quality and properly evaluated research is needed, as are improvements in descriptions of the methodology and the study processes. These improvements will allow WhatsApp Messenger to be categorically defined as an effective telemedicine tool in many different fields of health care.
Source:PubMed