MyDirectives® Launches Advance Care Planning App for iPhone
New app gives customers an easy way to populate their Medical ID in iOS 8 with their MyDirectives advance care plan
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 13, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- JPMorgan's global healthcare conference today is the site for digital healthcare leader MyDirectives' launch of its exciting new iPhone app. The MyDirectives MOBILE™ App allows consumers to digitize their voice and thoughts in a legal advance care plan that is secure in the cloud and available 24/7 anywhere in the world. In addition, and exclusively for iOS 8 users, the app makes it easy for consumers to populate their Medical ID, part of Apple's new Health app, with their MyDirectives advance care plan information -- which gives doctors access to vital information right from a patient's iPhone lock screen.
"We are honored to offer consumers a first-rate user-friendly experience to create, update, store, retrieve and now enhance and share their healthcare preferences and thoughts on their iPhone," said MyDirectives CEO and co-founder Jeff Zucker. "Our new app is pushing the healthcare industry to put the voice of the consumer, literally, at the center of a person's care."
MyDirectives makes it easy to create a state-of-the-art emergency medical care plan that can include medical treatment goals and objectives, preferences regarding palliative and hospice care, organ donation and autopsy, and other critical personal information like healthcare agents. Consumers can answer questions in their own words or pick from a selection of the most common answers, with as much detail as they wish. Once an advance care plan is created, any consumer with an iPhone running iOS 8 can tap the "Copy Information" button, launch the Apple Health app, and then paste their information in the "Medical Notes" field in Medical ID. This gives emergency care providers access to your most vital information without having to unlock the iPhone.
MyDirectives president and co-founder Scott Brown said, "The MyDirectives MOBILE App, along with the award-winning MyDirectives.com web platform, empowers consumers to create meaningful emergency, critical and advance care plans in a fully legal advance medical directive format with the ease found in many other great retail sites. Today's launch lets consumers go a step further to include video messages and state-of-the-art signature features. They can populate key elements into their Medical ID in iOS 8, which can then be accessed from the iPhone lock screen, helping first responders and doctors access the critical information in real time."
"The MyDirectives advance care planning tool is already the most consumer- and provider-friendly tool for creating and retrieving personalized health care directives," said Dr. Robert Fine, clinical director of clinical ethics and palliative care at Baylor Scott & White Health, one of the country's largest healthcare providers. "Now, they are taking advance care planning one important step further: giving people the option to make their advance care plans instantly available to emergency personnel or any others they may choose via their iPhone."
Dr. Monica Williams-Murphy, a board-certified emergency physician at the University of Alabama Huntsville Hospital, where she also serves as the medical director for advance care planning and end-of-life education, said, "By giving people the ability to both create a comprehensive emergency care plan and populate it into their Medical ID with just a few taps, MyDirectives is transforming today's healthcare. MyDirectives was designed with consumer engagement as its core goal, and it allows users to articulate their medical preferences so that we as doctors can treat them the best. For a patient's loved ones, there is nothing like hearing their wishes in their own words – which MyDirectives allows via the ability to upload videos – to know that you are making the right decisions at a time of crisis."
Both the MyDirectives MOBILE™ App and MyDirectives.com are free to consumers. There are no advertisements, no mailing lists are sold or rented, and the platforms exceed global health privacy protocols, giving consumers confidence their information is safe and secure. MyDirectives is paid license fees from healthcare industry partners that facilitate adoption, access and retrieval during a health crisis.
Named by PC Magazine as one of the 100 best websites, MyDirectives.com has achieved critical acclaim since quietly launching in 2012. Now with consumer users in all 50 states and more than 20 countries, the platform is adding a mobile option at a time of increasing consumer demand for people's voices to be heard across all facets of daily life.
About MyDirectives.com
MyDirectives®, a service of Dallas, Texas-based ADVault, Inc., is the first completely digital advance directive that is secure, legal, easy to understand and free to consumers. MyDirectives.com has been recognized by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for becoming one of the first small businesses to reach full Blue Button® compatibility, which allows individuals to easily, quickly and securely download their electronic healthcare records. MyDirectives is also the first advance care platform to receive meaningful use certification from HHS so that hospitals may be eligible for incentive payments from Medicare and Medicaid under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act when using this technology.
MyDirectives' Universal Advance Digital Directive (uADD)™ is the first all-digital advance care plan to be used worldwide. The uADD simplifies more than 200 legalistic forms throughout the world and offers users the chance to include audio and video messages designed to create a superior emergency, critical and advance care plan. MyDirectives MOBILE™, launched in 2015, is found exclusively in the App Store.
Additional information can be found at MyDirectives.com, Facebook.com/MyDirectives and Twitter.com/MyDirectives.
SOURCE MyDirectives
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