This fall, the Department of Veterans Affairs plans to release new mobile health applications aimed at helping veterans access and manage their health records, FierceMobileHealthcare reports (Mottl, FierceMobileHealthcare, 9/4).

Mobile App Details

Neil Evans -- co-director of Connected Health at VA's Veterans Health Administration -- said the two mobile applications will be versions of desktop applications currently available via a VA health portal, called My MyHealtheVet (Pai, MobiHealthNews, 9/9).

The soon-to-be-released apps are:

• Summary of Care, which gives veterans access to their electronic health records; and
• The mobile Blue Button, which allows veterans to create a PDF and share their health data with providers (Miller, Federal News Radio, 9/3).

The Blue Button initiative first launched in August 2010 as a way for veterans to download their health care claims data from the Department of Veterans Affairs' MyHealtheVet website (iHealthBeat, 1/20/12).

Evans said VA has several other mobile apps that it plans to release to veterans over the next few years (Federal News Radio, 9/3).

Some of those apps could include:

• HealthAdvocate, which allows veterans to grant providers access to all of their personal health data;
• HealthAssessment, which allows veterans to complete self-assessments and share the data with their providers; and
• Rx Refill, which allows veterans to request prescription refills (MobiHealthNews, 9/9).

Evans said, "We've learned from our experience that MyHealtheVet patients value seeing their personal health data." He added, "We've also learned that they value it on mobile device through our family caregiver pilot, so it seemed a logical next step to deliver that experience nationally to veterans."

VA To Launch App Store

Evans also said that VA plans to launch an app store this fall that will house all of the new mobile apps (Federal News Radio, 9/3).

In 2012, VA awarded a $9.3 million contract to Longview International Technology Solutions to develop the store and create a mobile device management system (MobiHealthNews, 9/9).

The store will support apps available on various operating platforms, including:

• Android;
• Apple's iOS;
• BlackBerry; and
• Windows Mobile (FierceMobileHealthcare, 9/4).