Using of the internet and mobile apps, at work, by the

medical personnel from Romania

Dr. Mihai Negrea

About• Before developing an app for medical doctors in Romania we wanted

to know if there is interest• To learn how doctors use mobile devices• Computers• Internet connection at work• And if they use it for work purposes or not

How?• We developed a questionnaire • We`ve put it on the website www.DrGrouper.ro• It wasn’t publicly available only by certain link• We advertised it to people interested in medicine- profession doctors

on Facebook also based on their University studies and age (25-65 years) both men and women• Budget spent 100 LEI to send the add. We got 227 valid answers out

of 339 clicks (66.69%)

The Ad – Boosted Post

Results• Professional degree- Consultant 30.39% Resident MD 48.01% Registrar MD

21.58%• General Practitioner 11.01%, clinical physicians 80.17%, paraclinic physicians

8.81%• 98.68% have smartphones• 60.35% also own a tablet• 91.62% – have internet connection on their own terminals• 37.44% don`t have access to internet from the hospital/unit they work in• 14.97% have bad connection to internet at work• 5.28% don`t use internet at work

When they need medical/professional information at work• 98.23% use internet at work to find professional information• Consultants use smartphones – 69.56%, laptop or pc – 27.53%, and

books 2.89%.• Registrar MDs – 79% use smartphones, 20.42% laptop or PC• Residents MDs – 88.99% smartphones, 9.17% use laptop or pc, 1.83%

use books

Willing to pay for medical apps• Consultants – 43.47%• Registrar MDs – 34.69%• Resident MDs – 35.77%

Discussions• It was only an online questionnaire – so we could target the MDs that

use Facebook and internet• We didn`t mean to use these data as scientific data about app usage

so we don`t have information about gender, age, or medical specialization• We would`ve need some control questions but in the start-up

environment it`s difficult to make big questionnaires• Also the only incentive was full access before launching the

DrGrouper app and future development to premium app

Conclusions• For Romanian medical doctors internet is the first choice for looking for

professional information• Resident Mds are more likely to use their phones to search for information• Consultants are more likely to pay for professional apps or access to

information• Books are not the first choice to look for information regardless of the

professional degree • Although we know this a significant range of hospitals and medical units

don`t have internet access • We can presume that there is a commercial market for professional apps

for MDs

Further studies

• Studies on hospital or medical units – about behavior regarding technology and solutions for doctors• Studies about commercial development of medical apps and websites• Studies about scientific validity of medical apps and liability