Use of Mobile and Social Apps to Achieve Public Health Goals: Lessons Learned From the FDA

Background:  The prevalence of mobile applications is growing at an astounding rate.  In fact, recent data indicates there will be 500 million+ health apps in use by 2015. While the number of apps focused on health issues is growing, a relatively small number of individuals actively use these mobile health applications.  According to recent Pew data, 9% of U.S. adults use mobile health apps, with greater prevalence in minority audiences: African Americans (15%) and Hispanics (11%). Developing an app that is effective and popular with audiences is challenging.  To better understand the environment, this presentation will showcase the mobile landscape, present best practices in designing a sticky application, and illustrate how the Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is using this data to drive innovation and improve the public health.

Program background:  CTP is responsible for implementing the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act with the goal of reducing the tremendous toll of disease and death caused by tobacco use.  To accomplish this, CTP identified key audiences – including, the public, retailers who sell tobacco products, and state officials – who would benefit from getting FDA tobacco information and services on the go. For these audiences, mobile applications can be a critical tool in finding answers to questions about new regulations, educating peers about tobacco issues, and learning how to enforce the new tobacco control laws.  Therefore, CTP has begun work on mobile applications that can achieve these goals, including:   

• FDA & State Tobacco Control Laws on the Go:  Helps individuals find state/federal laws based on their location using a searchable mobile interface.
• Mobile Violation Reporting: Empowers people on-the-go to report tobacco purchasing violations when they see them, from any location.    
• Graphic Health Warnings:  Allows individuals to create personalized warning labels and send messages to family/friends about quitting smoking.
• Retailer Tobacco Control Pledge:  Encourages retailers to take a pledge via their mobile phone to show that they work to keep tobacco products out of the hands of minors.
• Compliance Education for Retailers: Allows users to find compliance training/education from their mobile phone.  

Evaluation Methods and Results:  This presentation will showcase the factors that an organization needs to address before undertaking a mobile strategy, including the process of developing compelling concepts, evaluating feasibility, developing applications, marketing them to users, and evaluating the success of a mobile strategy.  

Conclusions:  When undertaking a mobile strategy, organizations need to realize that mobile channels need to be part of an integrated communications program. This presentation will present data and results on how an organization undertakes this process, the decisions that need to be considered, and ways in which other organizations can capitalize on lessons learned.  

Implications for research and/or practice:  While this presentation will showcase how to evaluate the success of your mobile communications, additional research is needed to better understand the power of mobile applications for health behavior change.