Women are leading the adoption of technology as health management tools
Over one in two adult Britons are now using gadgets and technology to manage their health and wellbeing, with even one in three over 65s turning to tech.
The news comes following the release of Apple’s latest iOS 9 update that took health tracking to new levels, allowing users to track their sexual health and ovulation cycles, among other things.
Research published in the UK Digital Health Report by PushDoctor found that checking medical symptoms, monitoring exercise levels, establishing individual BMI scores, monitoring heart rates and checking blood pressure are the top five most common ways we are now using technology to understand and manage our wellbeing.
Tracking calorie intake, measuring sleep quality, testing our vision, monitoring stress levels and moods also followed in the top 10.
Altogether, 71% of British adults feel positive about using technology to better understand their bodies, their habits and how they can directly affect state of health, believing technology is helping them to be more aware of and more in control of their health, as opposed to too aware.
The research also found that women are leading the adoption of technology as health management tools. However, rather than there being a lack of interest amongst men, the data suggests they are simply just late adopters, as they have a comparatively greater appreciation of the awareness and control over their health that technology brings.
The data shows that at least one in two of all age groups except for the over 65s have used a gadget to monitor their health, with 18 to 24 year olds naturally leading the way, with 91% having done so.
But even more than 37% of over 65 year olds have monitored their wellbeing using technology, suggesting it is a trend that is here to stay.
The study also found that residents in Sheffield and Birmingham are the cities leading adoption of technology for health purposes, with 67% and 65% of the resident population doing this. Meanwhile, Glaswegians (47%) and Geordies (49%) are amongst the slowest adopters of this trend.
Eren Ozagir, CEO and founder at PushDoctor, said: “We use technology to manage nearly every aspect of our lives, from socialising, to organising our finances and heating of our homes. The adoption of health tech by the general population remains a natural next step; with more and more people discovering how their health information can be used to guide and control and enhance their everyday lives.
“Sports and fitness trackers, gave way to more advanced health-tech monitoring and interpretation tools, and now we have really applicable digital health tools like blood pressure and glucose applications,” continued Ozagir. “Combined usage can provide a view of individual their past and current health state, which can be used by you or your doctor to inform what you do next; what you do day to day to improve your general wellbeing or tackle a range of conditions working with a clinician to interpret and use this data to take action to ultimately improve your short, medium and long term health conditions.”
