Apple Health App 1

mHealth Assessment

Apple Health App

Andrew Escobar

CSUCI

Dr. Berkowsky

HLTH 302
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Intro

The app I selected to review is the Health App that has been on Apple Iphones since 2014.

This app is basically your centralized health hub where you can place and view your health records.

You decide which information is placed in Health and which apps can access your data through the

Health app. When your phone is locked with a passcode, Touch ID, or Face ID, all of your health

and fitness data in the Health app other than your Medical ID is encrypted. Your health data stays

up to date across all your devices automatically using iCloud, where it is encrypted while in transit

and at rest. Which makes it very reliable for holding all of your personal info.

Body

The app itself is not complicated to use. The app makes things easy for people for example

if you don't need all of the data that Health supplies you with, there's no use jumping around from

place to place within the app. You can add specific data points to the favorites tab on the main page

of the app. To do this, simply locate the data point you want to favorite, and tap the slider that says

Add to favorites. You can do this for as many data points as you like so you can focus on the data

you need and occasionally check on the things that are not as important to you.

There are many things I like about this app. I really appreciate how many apps are listed

under health categories. Activity, Body Measurements, Cycle Tracking, Hearing, Heart,

Mindfulness, Nutrition, Other data, Respiratory, Sleep, and Vitals. Under Health Records is the

following: Allergies, Clinical Vitals, Conditions, Immunizations, Lab Results, Medications, and
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Procedures. Each of these categories has so much information for you to fill out about yourself. For

example i'll talk about about the Activity tab the data you can insert is Active energy, Activity,

Cycle Distance, Downhill Snow Sports Distance, Exercise Minutes, Nike Fuel, Pushes, Resting

Energy, Stand Hours, Stand Minutes, Swimming strokes, V02 max, Wheelchair distance, and

workouts. All of the things I just listed you can then add your data for them and see how much you

do over the week. I really enjoy looking at this personally because as a firefighter it's very important

to see how much activity I'm doing, so when I'm home checking the app I know how much I have

to eat to be hitting a caloric surplus for a continuous clean bulk up. Also being able to track my V02

max is very beneficial to me when I go on crew hikes because through the weeks I can see the slight

changes in my cardiovascular endurance or if I'm slacking and I need to step up my cardio and head

out of the gym. Also another part of the fitness app I will take advantage of in the present till the

around 6 months is the body fat percentage tracker. I could see the differences that are being made

in the variations of doing a blend of surfing and hiking vs weightlifting and hiking. That would help

me see what workouts combinations are providing me with the best outcome for lower body fat

percentage. The interactive charts in the Heart category lets you quickly see health trends, your

cholesterol, resting heart rate, heart rate, and many more. I can appreciate this to make sure my

cardiovascular health is good. Especially with all this COVID19 news, being able to track your

respiratory health is essential. This app makes it possible to track your sickness or if you're slowly

getting sick. I think just on that note this app was really sold into being a part of one of my main

applications on my iphone.
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What I didn't like about this app was the Nutrition category. I felt like it was a lot to log

every type of biotin, caffeine, iron, magnesium, etc. I felt like there are many other apps that do the

nutrition portion a little bit easier for users. Such as MyPlate, I had to do a project in my Nutrition

class last semester. I used that and the interface was much easier for logging your daily nutritional

necessities. I felt like the Apple Health app is a very broad hub but some of the resources on them

were too vague on their amount of information being able to be monitored. I would make this app

better by simplifying the nutrition category with being able to add specific foods, liquid

consumption, and maybe some pie charts for the aesthetic. Also increasing the accuracy of the

results of steps, miles ran, and swimming strokes. Sometimes I feel like I did much more than the

results shown, especially in swimming.

I would recommend this app to all users with an iphone because it is already a

pre-downloaded app. If you put the time into setting up your medical ID, link your records, and

actively engage in filling out the categories of health you care about. This app did not take too

much time out of my day because the activities are auto and the other categories are occasional

updates that take less than 10 minutes. I believe this app would be very beneficial to anyone who

wants to keep track of their health records, present day health, fitness, or sleep schedules.

I feel like this app isn't an instant improve all in one day kind of thing. For your health to

improve you will have to take the time to track your health data and understand the trends and

changes that are happening. This would help guide you to see if you're on the right path to your

goals. For me it will help me reach the most of my potential by helping me track my cardiovascular
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endurance and V02 max. Being able to see the trends of improvement will give me the confidence

to push myself harder because I will be knowledgeable that my body can handle it.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I have continued and will continue to use the Apple Health App long term.

I’ve had an Iphone since I can remember and I don't think I'm switching to android anytime soon

which means the Health App isn't going anywhere. The Health App can be a great resource to take

advantage of and all you have to do is put the time in. This app is your centralized health hub where

you can place and view your health records. I will continue to use the Heart, Activity, and

Respiratory categories to help me reach my fitness goals. The results will be more beneficial over

time.
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References

Capritto, A. (2019, April 18). The complete guide to Apple's Health app. Retrieved May 14, 2020,

from https://www.cnet.com/health/the-complete-guide-to-apples-health-app/