"Cape Town University is using wireless phone text messaging to help South African HIV patients. The Cell Life project, run by researchers at the University of Cape Town, allows counselors to monitor HIV patients and send their information securely to researchers to track patients' progress. The service is quick, reliable and, most important for the cash-strapped, cheap. Each message costs only four cents to send. (Source: BBC News) "
Although this is an interesting use of technology (and aligns well with oodles of paper-proposals i just reviewed that have to do with health-related use of information communication technologies) I can't help but wonder how this may isolate the poorer populations of South Africa who are much more likely to share a phone with the rest of the family (or several families) rather than owning them individually (how many do not own cell phones either? although in South Africa penetration is far higher than in most other parts of Africa). Nevertheless, this is an interesting use of the technology and I wonder whether it will have a detectible impact on these patients and the progression of the disease.
I used SMS for a good two years to remind me to take drugs. The only time I forgot to take drugs was when I was in Vienna, off of AT&T's fine TDMA network.
ReplyDeleteN=1, but hey, it's a point...
wow that's cool... these days the AT&T glorious GSM network works flawlessly in most European countries (although you'd have to pay 25cents per message instead of the customary 10, but still nothing for incoming). I guess having a device that is always with you and that is capable of receiving timely information can aid in developing pretty intense habitual behaviors (the problem is when the device breaks down obviously... that's when we get to start talking about the concept of "fail soft").
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