Empowerment or concealed compliance? A review of literature on mobile ICT solutions for patient empowerment

Healthcare systems are under pressure because of demographic changes and increased demand. Patient empowerment is seen as a powerful approach to cope with this pressure. Information technology is used in various forms to promote patient empowerment, and carries a perceived potential. We did a systematic review of literature in order to find out how information technology is used to enable empowerment. We found that most of the solutions are in reality promoting a compliance model and not an empowerment model. We discuss some possible reasons, and promote the untapped potential of a new generation of solutions.