mHealth in the global south : the use of mobile phones in health projects - Al Dahdah, Marine (Delhi, India, 2014)
In 2014, almost seven billion people were mobile phone users, thus propelling mobile phone ahead of all ICTs. From mobile Personal Health Record to confidential clinical data send by SMS, those devices are increasingly used to provide “better" services with less financial and human resources and more implication of health consumers. Among ICTs for health, Internet has been extensively studied whereas the use of mobile technologies for health called mHealth or mobile Health has been less documented so far. This communication offers an overview of this new field. First by assessing the current state of knowledge on mobile health in developing countries, as well as the issues and challenges raised by mobile health. We then focus our discussion on the link between mHealth and Global Health. Finally we’ll present the study of a particular project deployed in West Africa for pregnant women. We propose to focus more specifically on the perceptions of the end-users - health professionals and pregnant women- of this technology as an expression of its effects.
Keywords: presentation; ICT; mHealth; mobile health; mobile phone