Heart Disease Risk App Wins Million Hearts Challenge
The Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation won the nationwide competition for a mobile app that helps people prevent heart disease. It's available on iTunes.
A free mobile app that helps people assess their heart disease risk has won the Million Hearts Challenge, HHS announced on Valentine's Day. Available through iTunes, the Heart Health Mobile app was created by the Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation and was announced by Dr. Farzad Mostashari, national coordinator for health information technology, and Dr. Janet Wright, executive director of the Million Hearts initiative.
"The Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation has created an app to give people easy access to some of the most advanced health care analytics available to learn the factors that put them at risk for heart attacks and how to prevent them," Mostashari said. "People can now get information about their risk and share what they know with their doctor to better manage their heart health."
The app provides information about a person's risk for heart disease based on answers to questions about height, weight, cholesterol levels, blood pressure, diabetes, and smoking status. In areas with participating pharmacies and other retail clinics, the app directs users to convenient locations for cholesterol and blood pressure screening. Heart Health Mobile offers a traditional version of the app and one that incorporates a game.
"The goal was to develop an app that helps Americans take simple steps to prevent heart disease, which is responsible for one in every three deaths in the U.S. Heart Health Mobile is simple and fun to use, and we hope will help people lead healthier lives," said Dr. Simon M. Lin, app project leader and director of the Biomedical Informatics Research Center at Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation. "As health care moves rapidly toward preventing disease, technology such as Heart Health Mobile can help people take charge of their health."
The app works on Apple iOS tablets, iPhones, and iPod Touch devices and can be downloaded free of charge from http://www.hearthealthmobile.com/. The Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation will release a web-based version that works on other devices next month.