WASHINGTON – Patients could use their cell phones to send physicians their medical and insurance information under a new initiative the Mobile Healthcare Alliance kicked off this week.

The Mobile Healthcare Alliance, or MoHCA, wants to enable mobile devices with a “consumer health manager” chip or specification that would help patients easily access and send healthcare information.

MoHCA officials say making these applications available over mobile devices could help in areas such as preventative care, geriatric care, disease management and sports medicine.

“I think it will be the major breakthrough in the whole health IT field,” C. Peter Waegemann, vice-chair of MoHCA and chief executive of the Medical Records Institute, told an audience of healthcare providers, mobile phone companies and IT vendors at the group’s meeting in Washington, D.C.

The use of personal health records among consumers is growing slowly, with less than one million people using such records to store their personal information, Waegemann said. MoHCA officials hope that access to such information on mobile devices could increase communication between providers and consumers, cut down on medical errors and save time.

Under the plan, such a service would allow a user to send basic medical and insurance information to their doctor before a visit. Patients also could receive medication reminders, confirm appointments, get test results or even use their cell phones to send a Continuity of Care Record, a standard under development that would provide a snapshot of a patient’s current and past treatments.

The application would hold duplicate data and patient information would still be stored with the provider. If a patient lost their cell phone, they could still retrieve the data from their provider.

Waegemann said the consumer health manager project is not meant to replace electronic health records. But he does see the application becoming available in the next two to three years, faster than most Americans would have an EHR.

Steven Waldren, MD, assistant director of the American Academy of Family Physicians’ Center for Health Information Technology, said there is a potential value in such communication if it allowed doctors to innovate without increasing their overhead costs.

In the meantime, MoHCA will begin to look at the privacy and security issues about sending data over cell phones and the ease of use. The group is hoping to get consensus from those in the healthcare industry about the data set for such an application. MoHCA is also seeking representatives from telecommunications carriers to participate in the effort. The group will meet in June to discuss a model for the project.