In 2016 the American Medical Association (AMA) and a number of other health-related organizations partnered to establish Xcertia, with the goal of developing guidelines for safe and effective digital health apps that will facilitate virtual care, including remote patient monitoring for chronic diseases. This is an emerging set of technologies, which is largely unregulated. Many solutions are not evidence-based and have not demonstrated that they are safe and effective tools for use as part of a patient’s treatment plan.

Xcertia has now released a complete set of guidelines covering the privacy, security, operability, usability and clinical content of mHealth solutions: https://xcertia.org/news-announcements/. The guidelines are now available for public comment until May 15, 2019 at: https://www.xcertia.org/the-guidelines/. Xcertia will rely on these public comments to create a final version of the guidelines.

Xcertia welcomes your comments and encourages you to join with us in recommending the guidelines to developers and physicians as a resource when considering mHealth solutions for their practice and to recommend to their patients.

For questions, comments or if you wish to join this effort, please contact Michael L Hodgkins, MD, VP & CMIO, AMA at michael.hodgkins@ama-assn.org.