Physicians' top 5 most-used medical apps for smartphones and tablets

Medical app usage in a medical practice was much higher among smartphone users (51% daily) than tablet users (30% daily), according to a report from American EHR Partners.

There's little doubt that lots of physicians are using medical apps on their smartphones and tablets, but doctors seem less-than-thrilled with those apps.

In a survey of about 1,400 physicians, only 28% of smartphone users and 18% of tablet users described themselves as "very satisfied" with the quality of apps for their profession, according to American EHR Partners, which is affiliated with the American College of Physicians.

Interestingly, medical app usage in a medical practice was much higher among smartphone users (51% daily) than tablet users (30% daily.)

Below are lists of physicians' most-used medical apps on smartphones and tablets, according to the report.

Top 5 apps for the iPhone and iPad

Epocrates (Free)

The king of all medical apps, Epocrates enables physicians to review drug prescribing and safety information, select health insurance formularies for drug coverage information, perform calculations like BMI and GFR and access medical news and research.

Medscape (Free)

A unit of WebMD, Medscape offers prescribing and safety information for drugs, procedure videos, a medical calculator and access to continuing medical education (CME) materials.

MedCalc ($1.99)

As its name implies, MedCalc features an exhaustive list of formulas, scales, scores and calculations.

Skyscape (Free)

This decision-support tool features drug information, a medical calculator, evidence-based clinical information and summaries of journal articles.

(Free)

A professional network for physicians, Doximity offers the opportunity to connect with other doctors and comes with HIPAA-compliant faxing, emailing and text messaging.

(Free)

Along with Doximity, Up To Date is the only app that doesn't appear on both the most-used apps for smartphones and tablets lists. Up To Date is a reference tool that comes with evidence-based recommendations, mobile-optimized calculators and a CME tracker.

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