Background: Mobile health has provided new and exciting ways for patients to partake in their healthcare. Wearable devices are designed to collect the user’s health data, which can be analysed to provide information about the user’s health status. However, little research has been conducted that addresses privacy and information security issues of these devices. Objective: To investigate the privacy and information security issues to which users are exposed when using wearable health devices. Method: The study used a cross-sectional survey approach to collect data from a convenience sample of 106 respondents. Results: Half of the respondents did not understand the need to protect health information. There also appeared to be a general lack of awareness among respondents about the information security issues surrounding their data collected by wearable devices. Conclusion: Users were not knowledgeable about the privacy risks that their data are exposed to or how these data are protected once collected. Implications: Users of wearable devices that collect personal information about health need to be educated about privacy and information security issues to which they are exposed when using these devices.

BackgroundSouth Africa is planning to implement the National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme in the near future. The NHI is intended to improve the accessibility of quality health care services for all South African citizens. For the NHI to achieve this objective, an electronic health record (EHR) system to register and track patients who visit different health care providers will have to be developed.AimTo identify critical success factors for the implementation of EHRs in South Africa’s public health care sector.SettingThis study reviewed studies on EHR implementation in African countries published between 2006 and 2017.MethodsThe study made use of a systematic literature review to identify barriers to the implementation of EHRs in the public health care sector.ResultsFifteen articles were included in the study. The study identified technical, social and environmental barriers to the implementation of EHRs. The barriers could further be broken down into lack of supporting infrastructure; user training and commitment; political influence or strategy; legislation and regulations; and the lack of a framework for implementation and management of EHRs. The study suggests six main recommendations for the successful implementation of EHRs in South Africa’s public health care sector.ConclusionThe study recommended investing in alternative infrastructure facilities, incentivising the health informatics field to attract and retain information and communication technology professionals and to encourage the participation of all stakeholders in the development process to develop context-relevant e-health implementation strategies, legislation and frameworks. Government should also allocate separate budgets for e-health projects.

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Using mobile phones to disseminate health information to students is a useful, convenient, and cost-effective health-promotion strategy. This research has contributed to the body of knowledge concerning the applicability of the UTAUT framework to study the adoption of technology and provided useful information to guide future research and implementation of mHealth initiatives.

Cyber bullying has become a topical issue among school learners in South Africa. However, there is very little guidance for schools on how to deal with cyber bullying from the South African Department of Basic Education. This study investigated the perceptions of cyber bullying in primary and secondary schools among student teachers in the Eastern Cape. The study made use of a quantitative survey approach to collect data from 150 student teachers at a university in the Eastern Cape. The student teachers were representative of all four of the school phases. The results indicated that cyber bullying is a serious issue at the schools but that the topic has not been incorporated into policy or the school curriculum yet. The recommendation of the study is that the South African Department of Basic Education must provide a standardized policy that schools can use to implement and enforce cyber safety behavior in the schools.