Digital Health (dHealth) encompasses everything from healthcare IT to Mobile Health. Mobile Health (mHealth) refers more specifically to the use of mobile communication devices (phones, iPads, etc) in conjunction with biosensors and/or internet and social media to improve and manage health.
UCSF Digital Health Group
This informal working group aims to:
- Provide a unified approach, architecture, online branding, and technical services for developing digital health applications at UCSF
- Lay the foundation and facilitate the development of creative digital applications for our patients for both health-related, research, and training purposes
Join the Digital Health Group
Send an email to join the Digital Health Group (leave the subject line of the email blank).
- You'll receive announcements about activity in the Digital Health field at UCSF and beyond.
- Direct questions to Aenor Sawyer
- Tip: to identify yourself as a researcher in the Digital Health field, use the term "Digital Health" in the overview or interests section on your UCSF Profiles page. Potential collaborators will then be able to find you by searching with keyword "Digital Health". Many researchers also identify themselves with the terms "Mobile Health" or "mHealth."
Funding
The UCSF Resource Allocation Program (RAP) provides intramural funding for Digital Health research, including the Catalyst Awards for the Development of Diagnostics, Devices, Therapeutics and Digital Health.
- Tips for applying for RAP Digital Health funding.
Join the UCSF Digital Health Group to receive announcements of extramural Digital Health funding opportunities.
Digital Health Consultation
Get expert advice from UCSF faculty that will guide you in the development of your Digital Health research project:
- Current trends & design ideas in health apps
- Advice on technical issues (e.g., privacy, connectivity to EHRs)
- Evaluation methods
- Usage patterns of mobile technology (e.g., digital divide)
- Referral to technical and legal services
Additional Resources
UCSF & UC Resources
- Center for Digital Health Innovation: Focus on digital technology development and the creation of technology platforms for precision medicine
- SOM Technology Services: Design, discovery, and agile development
- Eureka Research Platform: For online, mobile, and hybrid research studies, use Eureka, the cloud-based, HIPAA compliant research platform, created at UCSF and approved by UCSF IT Security. Key features include:
- Mobile and web app study experience for fully remote or hybrid data collection
- Rapid remote recruitment from 400,000+ already-engaged participants or your own new participants
- Electronic / remote consent process, questionnaires, and other patient-generated data
- Wearable and mobile device data collection
- EHR integration via FHIR
- Coordinator data entry (eg: eCRFs)
- Flexible automated reminders for optimized engagement and follow-up
- Study management portal with raw data and customizable reports on demand with flexible access permissions
- Video presentations on digital health:
- Ida Sim, PhD, MD — Data Integration and Interoperability: Why Is It So Darned Hard?
- Ida Sim, PhD, MD — Electronic Health Records: Not the Center of the IT Universe
- Danielle Schlosser, PhD — PRIME: A Mobile App for Improving Quality of Life in Schizophrenia
- Timothy Hoffman, CISSP, ISP, GCIH, CIEH — IT Security is Everyone's Responsibility
- UCSF Innovation Ventures: Intellectual property (IP) management services to help you commercialize and build your ideas in digital health
- Protection of your ideas via patents and copyright IP oversight
- Marketing your ideas to relevant companies
- Commercialization of your ideas through Technology Licensing agreements
- Contract negotiation
- Alliance and partnership management
- Referral to external business partners
- Developer partnerships for mHealth and eHealth applications
- Venture capital and angel funding opportunities
- Assistance with technology spin-outs
- Campus signature authority for sponsored research and licensing agreements
- Technology Disclosure and Income Distribution Forms
- Please contact [email protected] with questions
- SOLVE Health Tech: a health equity accelerator based at UCSF that aims to bridge public health expertise with companies developing health technology to create and adapt products that truly reach all populations.
- Quantitative Image Processing Center in the Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging: Mobile application development and deployment support; expertise in database-backed application development and prototype production on iOS.
- Rosenman Institute: Initiative to drive medical device innovation at UCSF and improve patient care by supporting promising entrepreneurs to develop technologies from concept to commercialization.
- Telehealth Resource Center: Supports programs that allow the expertise of UCSF physicians to be shared remotely.
- Health Technology Interest Group at UCSF: brings together members of the UCSF community who share interests in health technology, informatics, and entrepreneurship. Contact them if you have a summer research internship opportunity.
- Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS): UC organization that creates information technology solutions for pressing social, environmental, and health care problems.
External Resources
- Android Developers Meetup Groups: developers may be willing to do a free mockup
- Connected and Open Research Ethics (CORE): guidance on ethical issues in the use of mobile and social technologies
- FDA Digital Health: provides clarity on many digital health topics, using practical approaches that balance benefits and risks
- HealthIT.gov: The Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) hosts a roundtable with the public, industry, and subject matter experts to discuss how to better safeguard health information while using mobile devices
- Journal of Medical Internet Research
- mHealth Evidence: an online reference tool designed to help researchers quickly locate literature demonstrating the feasibility, usability and efficacy of mobile technologies in healthcare
- mHealthHub: a virtual forum where technologists, researchers and clinicians connect, learn, share, and innovate on mHealth tools
