As the mobile ecosystem continues to expand to include more and more vertical sectors, healthcare, perhaps more than any other, is emerging as an area that has the potential to deliver the most striking benefits to consumers. Recent research conducted by research2guidance in collaboration with health and IT body HIMSS Europe assessed the market readiness of the 28 EU member states for the adoption of mHealth into patient treatment and care against 26 different criteria.
The study, which indexed the views of 5,000 participants, found that Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK are the top five countries offering the best market conditions for mobile health app companies. You can download the full report from the research2guidance website.
As part of the largest global mHealth research programme, research2guidance and HIMSS Europe have come together to analyse the market readiness of the 28 EU member states through “The EU Countries’ mHealth App Market Ranking” survey.
More than 5,000 app developers, healthcare professionals and mHealth practitioners were asked to share their opinion on EU market conditions. The practitioners view is combined with facts based evaluation for each country, based on five dimensions and 26 market condition criteria such as eHealth adoption, level of digitalization, market size and health expenditure, ease of starting a business and the mHealth regulatory framework.
Denmark, Finland, The Netherlands, Sweden and UK offer the best market conditions and proved to be the best starting points for mHealth companies. The UK emerged as the leader among those countries according to 55% of mHealth practitioners. The study revealed that this is mainly because of positive attitude of physicians in the UK to use technology and integrate mHealth solutions into patient treatments.
Ralf Jahns, Managing Director at research2guidance, who announced the survey results at the mHealth Summit Europe, said: “The survey is now in its sixth year and the response this time has been overwhelming becoming increasingly evident that the momentum around mHealth is growing at a rapid pace. The report is extremely valuable for anyone thinking about starting an mHealth company, as well as for government organisations in European countries that want to benefit from a flourishing mHealth ecosystem through creating highly qualified jobs, reducing national healthcare costs and ensuring high levels of quality of care.”
Germany and France are the most complicated markets in EU for mHealth: on the one hand these two markets have enormous potential when it comes to the amount which has been invested in patients, doctors, hospitals and healthcare on a whole. However, rankings for eHealth and mHealth adoption in Germany and France were extremely low, showing these countries are more reluctant to embrace the digitalisation of healthcare, thus classifying themselves as “average” countries to invest in mHealth.
Rainer Herzog, General Manager at HIMSS Europe added: “The timing of the report is particularly important as it coincides with the mHealth Summit Europe which will bring together the most important stakeholders in the mHealth industry in Europe. The survey results will provide a great platform for discussion and give us an insight into how ready European countries really are to adopt mHealth and the challenges that some countries are yet to overcome, meanwhile giving entrepreneurs a head-start when deciding which country would be best to start an mHealth business.”
