November 30, 2015 – Cardio Text

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:04 — 1.5MB)

Subscribe: RSS

Anchor lead: Can electronic intervention help heart disease? Elizabeth Tracey reports

Mobile health interventions are a burgeoning field, with apps and smart phones utilized to assist people in progressing toward their goals, but so far, most have produced disappointing results.  Now a strategy known as mActive, developed by cardiologist Seth Martin and colleagues at Johns Hopkins, seems to be helping those with existing cardiovascular disease make beneficial lifestyle changes.

Martin: What we found in our mActive trial is that our smart text messages which were based on how much activity a person was getting, a certain time of day, used their cardiologist’s name, their dog’s name, spouse’s name, a lot of personal features, those increased physical activity by a mile a day.  So we’re really encouraged by this initial result and we’re working on following up folks in our trial a year out, and figuring out how we can scale this up to a bigger long term trial.  :30

At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.