Assessing the Impact of Patient-Facing Mobile Health Technology on Patient Outcomes: Retrospective Observational Cohort Study.

Background: Despite the growth of and media hype about mobile health (mHealth), there is a paucity of literature supporting the effectiveness of widespread implementation of mHealth technologies.

Objective: This study aimed to assess whether an innovative mHealth technology system with several overlapping purposes can impact (1) clinical outcomes (ie, readmission rates, revisit rates, and length of stay) and (2) patient-centered care outcomes (ie, patient engagement, patient experience, and patient satisfaction).

Methods: We compared all patients (2059 patients) of participating orthopedic surgeons using mHealth technology with all patients of nonparticipating orthopedic surgeons (2554 patients).