As the end of 2011 approaches, online marketplaces are publishing the usual flurry of year-end lists compiled from the best 2011 had to offer. Apple is no exception. Its recently launched its annual "App Store Rewind 2011" section in iTunes. The lists include Apple's picks for the year's best overall games and apps for iOS devices: the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.
Ten of the apps listed below are for the iPhone (also iPod touch) while others listed were developed specifically for the iPad.
Apple's picks include both consumer and professional health apps: "Browse our favorite apps from this year in all 21 categories," Apple wrote in its brief description leading up to the lists of top five apps for each of the App Store's categories, including its Medical and its Health & Fitness categories.
MobiHealthNews can only speculate on the criteria that Apple used to determine its "favorites" -- total downloads cannot be the only factor, since many apps we know to have millions of downloads didn't make the cut, while other apps with far fewer downloads did.
Apple's medical app picks include a few that received FDA clearances this year, apps from closely-watched startups that had high profile launches, apps that enjoyed top billing on Apple's continually updated top app lists, and more. Surprisingly, two apps that made the list were developed by the same medical software company.
No surprise that FDA cleared apps made the list: Arguably, FDA regulation of mobile medical apps was the big issue of 2011. The agency's clearance practices had been notoriously opaque for companies wishing to get their smartphone-enabled medical peripherals and apps cleared. In response, the FDA offered up a set of draft guidelines this past summer that propose how the agency might regulate certain mobile medical apps.
While the conversation around mobile medical apps grew louder and the discussion itself matured -- at least a little bit -- adoption appeared to be fairly flat.
In its most recent survey conducted in August, Pew Research found that health app adoption has stagnated: about 11 percent of all adult cell phone users having downloaded an app that helps them manage their health. While that is a slight increase over last year’s number, Pew characterized it as “a statistically insignificant difference.” App adoption, therefore, has been largely stagnant over the past 12 months. Still, MobiHealthNews found in its 2011 apps reports that based on growth trends, the number of apps available has grown and will likely continue to do so: Consumer health apps for the iOS platform will likely number more than 13,000 by the summer of 2012, while 6,000 professional medical apps will likely be available by then.
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Read on to see Apple's choices in both the Health & Fitness and Medical categories (some app's iPad and iPhone versions were both chosen as top picks), along with the app's description, price, and more.
Health & Fitness
iMuscle (iPhone/iPad) - $1.99/$4.99
"iMuscle is a sophisticated workout aid that can be taken anywhere. Use it to identify a body part or individual muscle by zooming into a 3-Dimensional human body with the musculature exposed. Then access all the exercises associated with the development / rehabilitation of that muscle. All of the anatomical modeling, labeling and descriptions are medically correct making this an ideal app for physiotherapists."
Nike Training Club (iPhone) - Free
"Nike Training Club is a training app that gives you your own personal trainer, anytime, anywhere. Get lean, toned and strong with over 60 custom-built workouts, including new training regimens from five professional athletes, while you earn NTC reward workouts from Lea Michele and Rihanna’s personal trainer, Ary Nuñez."
"Inspired by world-class athletes and developed by Nike professional trainers, this comprehensive training app combines years of Nike training research and expertise in one personalized experience. Dynamic drills build on the fundamentals of functional fitness training. Detailed instruction and audio guidance keeps your training on track. Set to your own music and goals, Nike Training Club gives you the most efficient and effective workout to fast-track your results."
The Eatery (iPhone) - Free
"Want to take real steps to improve your eating habits? Use The Eatery to snap photos of your food. We’ll give you something much more helpful than calorie counts.Studies show that simply recording your meals helps you lose more weight. It's not about counting calories — it's about becoming aware of your habits. The Eatery makes that process fast and beautiful — just snap and rate. Get a second opinion on the healthiness of your meals Eat better by learning more about yourself."
MobiHealthNews covered The Eatery's launch this November in detail, including an interview with its head of business development Andrew Rosenthal. “We build things that people are going to love to use. Our approach has always been to focus on user engagement partly because no one else does," Rosenthal told us. "The more someone loves something, the more they use it, and the more opportunities we will have as a company to help them be healthy.”
Fooducate (iPhone) - Free
"Get Fooducate and hurry to the supermarket. Use your iPhone to: Automatically scan a product barcode, search for products, or browse by categories, See product's highlights (both good & bad), Compare products, Select healthier alternatives. Created by dietitians and concerned parents, it uses iphone's camera to effortlessly scan UPC barcodes (over 200,000 unique products and growing daily, while simplified information helps you make better choices. Fooducate analyzes information found in each product's nutrition panel and ingredient list."
P90X (iPhone) - $4.99
"P90X has evolved. The breakthrough workout program that revolutionized home fitness now has an app that lets you Bring It! on your iPhone, so you can get even more amazing results—and work out with P90X anywhere. Keep track of your sets, reps, and weights, view your progress, log your nutrition, and share your results. With interactive features like these, you'll stay motivated and accountable to get more out of P90X than ever. Plus, your data can automatically sync to Team Beachbody's online SuperGym. Get the complete P90X Guided Workout series—the best value—or just select the individual workouts you want."
FitnessClass (iPad) - Free
"Introducing FitnessClass - the only marketplace for real-time, on-demand fitness video workouts, right on your iPad. Choose from a selection of 300+ fitness classes by PumpOne and a collection of the world's elite fitness instructors with a la carte iTunes-style prices. Get 30 Day access to a class, or get it forever."
"FitnessClass lets you stream workout videos over WiFi or 3G while you listen to your own music (iOS 4+) and get interactive. Choose a new, different class every day, see estimated calorie counts for each class, post your completed status to Facebook & Twitter and keep track of every workout you perform."
Calorie Counter: diet & activities (iPad) - Free
"The best app to take care of your health! Perfect for various goals – weight loss, weight gain or keeping fit. Ultimate food database – more than 400,000 items with precise data on all most important parameters. The app will automatically calculate your needs for the intake of vitamins, minerals and nutrients. Create your own diets and physical activity plans: Body Tracker allows registering the changes of your body parameters and tracking the progress with the help of colorful graphs."
Pregnancy (Sprout) (iPad) - $3.99
"American Baby Magazine and Med ART Studios, America’s trusted resources for baby advice, bring you Sprout: the highest-rated pregnancy app for moms and moms-to-be. Helpful information about you and your baby, Stunning color images and 3D models, Weight tracker, kick counter, contraction timer, and Personal MyBaby and Doctor Says sections."
A quarter of all women's health apps are baby tracker apps, with pregnancy reference coming in a close second, MobiHealthNews discovered in our 2011 Consumer Apps Report.
Gorilla Workout : Athletic Fitness Training on a Budget (iPad) - $1.99
"Looking to lose weight, build muscle, and gain energy on a tight budget? Gorilla Workout is the perfect fitness app for you! Gorilla Workout is a fast-paced, no-equipment grouping of over 40+ exercises. Our daily body-weight only workout routines combine cardio and strength training interchangeably, to acheive maximum results in a short amount of time. Each exercise targets specific muscle groups to help you strengthen and tone your core, abs, chest, back, arms, and legs, and melt away excess fat. With no need for gyms or fancy equipment, every workout can be done in the smallest of spaces and in practically any location. This is the perfect fitness app for people who want to get in to seriously great shape, lose weight, and gain strength without breaking the bank."
Medical
AirStrip - Cardiology (iPhone) - Free
"AirStrip Cardiology is a pioneering mobile solution that allows clinicians to review the extent of a patient’s ECG history and completely changes the way that cardiac waveform data can be viewed, reviewed, analyzed and interacted with. In simplest terms, AirStrip Cardiology will allow for more timely and more accurate diagnosis and treatment of the cardiac patient; whether in the pre-hospital or in-patient space. Furthermore, AirStrip Cardiology allows for unprecedented collaboration between Emergency Medical Systems, Emergency Department and Cardiology teams – especially when transporting potential AMI and STEMI patients."
AirStrip has a notable achievement in the mHealth space: Its AirStripOB obstetrician app was the first iPhone medical app to receive FDA clearance.
Skeletal System Pro II - (NOVA Series) (iPhone/iPad) - $5.99/$14.99
"The Skeletal System Pro II - (NOVA Series) is a cutting edge app built on our NOVA technology. It is a completely new app, but in recognition of our loyal customers we are providing this application as a free update to the previous original Skeleton System Pro. Every detail has been re-designed from the photo-realistic 3D model to the quick navigation. There are thousands of changes - including the most in depth 3D skeleton ever developed, the ability to rotate, cut and get superior/inferior views all with the simple stroke of the finger."
This app’s primary use is as a learning tool but can also be used as a fast and innovative reference tool by utilizing the index function which allows the user to select an item and the app will automatically zoom in and identify it. Additionally, this app is ideal for physicians, educators or professionals, allowing them to visually show detailed areas of the bone system to their patients or students - helping to educate or explain conditions, ailments and injuries."
EyeDecideMD (iPhone/iPad) - Free
"Orca Health is proud to announce EyeDecide— the newest addition to the Decide Series! The Decide Medical App Series helps you, the patient, understand your medical condition and the treatments necessary for a healthy recovery. With an interactive user interface, owners of the Decide Series will have the ability to VIEW, EXPLORE, PINPOINT, LEARN, LOCATE, and SHARE the information they receive."
"VIEW the eye in 360 degrees. You have the ability to rotate, expand, shrink, annotate, and move the eye in any direction on the screen! View your eye in CROSS SECTION, EXPAND, or FULL ANATOMY. EXPLORE your eye’s anatomy layer by layer from the outer skin to bone to eyeball. You have the option to turn annotations on or off, and view more information along the side of your mobile device."
Mobile MIM (iPhone/iPad) - Free
"The Mobile MIM software program is used for the registration, fusion, and/or display for diagnosis of medical images from only the following modalities: SPECT, PET, CT, and MRI. Mobile MIM provides wireless and portable access to medical images. This device is not intended to replace full workstations and should be used only when there is no access to a workstation. The software is not to be used for mammography."
Mobile MIM was one of the very first medical applications to debut in Apple’s AppStore when it first launched in 2008, but the application also has the distinction of being the first medical application pulled from the store because of regulatory concerns. The FDA officially granted the mobile radiology application a 510(k) clearance, the first diagnostic radiology app to receive it, in February of this year.
VueMe (iPhone/iPad) - Free
"VueMe is intended to be used by patients for the non-diagnostic viewing of medical images. It features a powerful/intuitive interface, real-time multi-modality fusion and blending, 3D depth-shaded MIP movie, window/level adjustments with CT presets, secure, encrypted data trnsfer to device, optimized for both the iPad and iPhone, and image data can be transferred to the device by using MIMcloud."
VueMe is the patient-centered counterpart to MobileMIM. It launched in June, with MIM Software's CTO Mark Cain saying at the time that "we recognized that empowered patients would want to view and control their own medical data." A full interview MobiHealthNews did with Cain in 2010 can be found here.
Anatomy 3D: Organs (iPad) - $6.99
"Expand your knowledge of the organs with this robust application that combines 3D models, video, audio lectures, quizzes and text to create a rich learning experience. Includes detailed information on the brain, heart, stomach, spleen, pancreas, small intestines, reproductive organs, large intestines, kidneys, liver, skin and lungs. Also learn about cells, tissues and organ systems. Each section includes beautiful diagrams of the organ anatomy, histology and location, along with text, video, audio and 3d models that support easy learning."
