Improving the consumer’s engagement in their health has become the holy grail; we’re all searching for it. It seems every week some company is coming out with a new app, system or program claiming they’ve developed an incredible engagement tool that will finally get people involved in their health. Most have stumbled.
Could it be that we are overlooking something because it’s just not cool and there are potential HIPAA concerns? That something is SMS text messaging. Think about it, everyone has a cell phone and text is typically unlimited and has become the new way to communicate.
It also turns out, there are some very good studies to support text messaging to be effective and much more likely to be read and responded to than an app, phone call or email. As for HIPAA, there are ways to use a “text first” approach and stay HIPAA compliant. 
Listen to this episode of PopHealth Week with Ken Saitow of CareWire as he provides insights into text messaging, HIPAA compliance and use cases. He even touches upon seniors and Medicaid, both of whom respond well to text messaging.
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With secure messaging meeting HIPAA standards, we should expect healthcare providers to adopt instant messaging as a new approach for internal communication and doctor patient communication. http://www.hipaajournal.com/best-in-klas-for-secure-messaging/
Thanks Nigel for this comment, text messaging has many applications, and we should expect greater utilization. I believe the KLAS report was for the use case of practitioner to practitioner. As pointed out in the interview the CareWire platform is to facilitate communication between practitioners and their patients.