Digital Health And Wellness – How Technology Supports Your Wellbeing

Digital technology has changed so many aspects of our lives, including healthcare. Today, reliable health and wellness services are instantly available online to anyone with a smartphone and internet connection.

Technology offers us a lot of benefits. From using digital health technologies like fitness trackers and meditation apps to online digital health services and telemedicine, there are countless ways technology can help improve our health and well-being.

How can digital technology help improve our health and wellness? Read on to learn more.

What Is Digital Health and Wellness?

Simply put, digital health and wellness incorporate technology to address healthcare challenges and improve individual access. It has quickly become a thriving industry, with many software and hardware devices being part of the equation.

Just to mention a few, there are:

• Wearable gadgets
• Health monitoring devices
• Mobile health apps
• Artificial Intelligence
• Telemedicine

The idea behind digital health and wellness is that people can use this advanced technology to connect to healthcare practitioners for taliored care and education.

Digital tools like fitness tracking devices and apps, for example, help you monitor things like your activity level and calorie intake, but your doctor might also use this information to create a personalized fitness or health plan for you.

What Are the Benefits of Digital Health and Wellness?

Digital health and wellness have many benefits, but just like anything else, they can also be abused.

Telemedicine has made accessing medical care easy. But when a patient can simply call a doctor for a diagnosis or a referral, it’s easy to take advantage of. Hypochondriacs or people seeking attention or trying to get a prescription for medication from their doctors can abuse the system.

While the negatives are important to keep in mind, telemedicine is one of the best possible digital health and wellness tools. Anybody who doesn’t have easy access to healthcare can simply call and get the necessary medical assistance and guidance they need.

Here are some of the most common benefits of digital health and wellness:

Telemedicine

Telemedicine is worth looking at in more detail. This technology is critical for people who cannot access healthcare for any reason. Maybe they live in a remote area, have mobility difficulties, or have to follow COVID-19 restrictions.

Telemedicat has many exciting benefits. These include:

• Low costs: Healthcare is generally expensive, even for people who have health insurance.
• Emergency care for infants: Infants can spike fevers and get very sick, very quickly and seemingly out of the blue. With telemedicine, you don’t have to panic or, worse yet, scare yourself by looking up thesesymptoms online. Just your pediatrician’s office or arrange a virtual visit to talk to someone who will give you advice and tell you what to do next.
• No exposure: The Coronavirus pandemic showed us how quickly we can be exposed to diseases when we have contact with other people, especially in a hospital full of sick people. With telemedicine, you can avoid all this by staying at home and literally “phoning it in.”

Telemedicine isn’t beneficial to just the patients. It also allows healthcare professionals to have some semblance of a social life. They have the freedom to spend more time with their families by working from home.

Wearable Health Devices

As far as digital health technology, wearable tech has come a long way and saved lives. These devices track physical activity, sleep patterns, and many other metrics that help people monitor and improve their health.

This kind of health data can often be used by digital health experts and doctors as the user’s electronic health records.

Electronic health records are digital records of patients’ health information that health providers can access quickly and securely via the tech company that owns the device. This technology streamlines patient care and reduces errors, improving patient safety.

The data collected by your wearable device can also give healthcare providers actionable insights into your level of physical activity, sleep patterns, and eating habits. The list goes on depending on the digital technology the consumer or patient uses. Doctors can use these insights to formulate a suitable wellness plan for the patient.

Digital health and wellness have also incorporated the use of medical applications. These apps can track nutrition, exercise, stress levels, and other health metrics. Some apps even provide mental health support through mindfulness exercises and guided meditations.

Assistive Technologies

Very few digital health solutions in the digital space have had more impact on a massive scale, like those incorporating health systems and digital wellness to create assistive technologies.

Assistive technologies provide solutions to people who experience physical, cognitive, or visual impairments.

Disadvantages of Digital Health and Wellness

Of course, there are some potential drawbacks to digital health technology. These disadvantages include the following:

• Misuse: People suffering from hypochondria may believe they are sick even when they aren’t. Hypochondriacs can use digital advancements such as telemedicine to call around until they find a doctor to validate their suspicions and give them a prescription. Unfortunately, this only makes the condition worse.
• Lack of personal touch: Digital health and wellness are quickly becoming like social media – virtual relationships that feel real despite not being so. Calling a doctor might not be good enough when dealing with certain conditions. Some conditions simply can’t be diagnosed correctly remotely.
• It needs connectivity: Unfortunately, digital health and wellness rely on connectivity. Whether it is an internet or phone connection, people in remote areas who don’t have reliable connectivity are still underserved despite these advancements.  

When used responsibly and ethically, digital health technology has the potential to transform healthcare and support our overall well-being and healthy habits.

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