TY - JOUR
T1 - Personal health technologies, micropolitics and resistance
T2 - A new materialist analysis
AU - Fox, Nick J.
PY - 2017/3/1
Y1 - 2017/3/1
N2 - Personal health technologies are near-body devices or applications designed for use by a single individual, principally outside healthcare facilities. They enable users to monitor physiological processes or body activity, are frequently communication-enabled and sometimes also intervene therapeutically. This article explores a range of personal health technologies, from blood pressure or blood glucose monitors purchased in pharmacies and fitness monitors such as Fitbit and Nike+ Fuelband to drug pumps and implantable medical devices. It applies a new materialist analysis, first reverse engineering a range of personal health technologies to explore their micropolitics and then forward engineering personal health technologies to meet, variously, public health, corporate, patient and resisting-citizen agendas. This article concludes with a critical discussion of personal health technologies and the possibilities of designing devices and apps that might foster subversive micropolitics and encourage collective and resisting ‘citizen health’.
AB - Personal health technologies are near-body devices or applications designed for use by a single individual, principally outside healthcare facilities. They enable users to monitor physiological processes or body activity, are frequently communication-enabled and sometimes also intervene therapeutically. This article explores a range of personal health technologies, from blood pressure or blood glucose monitors purchased in pharmacies and fitness monitors such as Fitbit and Nike+ Fuelband to drug pumps and implantable medical devices. It applies a new materialist analysis, first reverse engineering a range of personal health technologies to explore their micropolitics and then forward engineering personal health technologies to meet, variously, public health, corporate, patient and resisting-citizen agendas. This article concludes with a critical discussion of personal health technologies and the possibilities of designing devices and apps that might foster subversive micropolitics and encourage collective and resisting ‘citizen health’.
KW - lifestyle
KW - technology in health care
KW - theory
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85015152790&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/1363459315590248
DO - 10.1177/1363459315590248
M3 - Article
C2 - 26216896
AN - SCOPUS:85015152790
VL - 21
SP - 136
EP - 153
JO - Health (United Kingdom)
JF - Health (United Kingdom)
SN - 1363-4593
IS - 2
ER -