Since their introduction, smartphones have rapidly taken over the world, as millions and millions of people own one of their own. Yet these devices aren’t just means of placing a phone call or accessing the Internet; their use extends far beyond those two basic functions. Indeed as studies have shown the use of a smartphone such as an iPhone and its apps can even stretch into the world of medicine.
Because smartphones can track and measure of multitude of things, in accordance to their widespread usage and ability to gather data renders them a highly sought after tool to be utilized by medical researchers. In fact, Apple has just released the ResearchKit, in an attempt to fully utilize the advantages of the smartphone to aid scientists in collecting and analyzing medical research.
Just last year, Apple released their Health app and apparatus for developers dubbed HealthKit, enabling them to create a software that could gather health data from other apps into one. Apple took things one step further with the release of ResearchKit, an open source tool that enables developers to develop apps specifically for performing medical research studies. Furthermore, the ResearchKit also gives users the advantage of attaining informed consent from participants directly, and helps cut the average process time of 30 minutes to reach a participant and obtain their consent.
“Traditional research has been constrained to informing potential participants about a study, the risks, the benefits and so on, by sitting directly with the participant (or on the phone) to step them through the paperwork and other material to complete the informed consent. With electronic consenting these limitation are all addressed. Potential study participants can be stepped through the informed consent using their iPhone, advanced multimedia can be used to more efficiently inform the participant as to the details of the studies as well as the risks and potential benefits, “said Dr. Eric Schadt from Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NY.
Schadt has been involved with Apple’s ResearchKit using it to collect data from an app known as Asthma Health, which informs users what areas to avoid by measuring air quality in order to prevent asthma attacks. Medical researchers then utilize such data by devising new methods to personalize treatment of the condition. The other feature of ResearchKit that both Apple and researchers are vying to promote is how much data will be attained by studies constructed around this new tool.
“For the researcher, especially disease research, it is all about the phenotypes. Today, cohorts assembled for disease collect very minimal numbers of phenotypes generally relating directly to the disease, and those phenotypes are collected infrequently, almost once a year. Studies conducted via iPhone app will differ in this respect. With the health apps being built we can collect phenotypes that relate across the disease and wellness spectra and we can do it at high frequency, every day, or 10 or 100 times a day,” said Schadt.
Since iPhones already have built-in features such as microphone, gyroscope, touch screen, accelerometer, and the global positioning system can all aid in acquiring and providing useful data to research studies. Yet drawbacks include that the data provided by the apps within a smartphone may not be as precise in comparison to utilizing tailor designed medical instruments. However, the quantity of participants alone may overshadow such limitations. As of now the most dependable studies are those that are carried out over a long period of time, which means it could be some time before any real significance using the ReasearchKit can have a lasting impact and contribution to medical research.
