Electronic health record: enabling the communication of patient data between different healthcare professionals (GPs, specialists etc.);

Computerized physician order entry: a means of requesting diagnostic tests and treatments electronically and receiving the results

ePrescribing: access to prescribing options, printing prescriptions to patients and sometimes electronic transmission of prescriptions from doctors to pharmacists

Clinical decision support system: providing information electronically about protocols and standards for healthcare professionals to use in diagnosing and treating patients

Telemedicine: physical and psychological diagnosis and treatments at a distance, including telemonitoring of patients functions;

Telerehabilitation: providing rehabilitation services over a distance through telecommunications.

Telesurgery: use robots and wireless communication to perform surgery remotely.

Teledentistry: exchange clinical information and images over a distance.

Consumer health informatics: use of electronic resources on medical topics by healthy individuals or patients;

Health knowledge management: e.g. in an overview of latest medical journals, best practice guidelines or epidemiological tracking (examples include physician resources such as Medscape and MDLinx);

mHealth or m-Health: includes the use of mobile devices in collecting aggregate and patient-level health data, providing healthcare information to practitioners, researchers, and patients, real-time monitoring of patient vitals, and direct provision of care (via mobile telemedicine);

Medical research using grids: powerful computing and data management capabilities to handle large amounts of heterogeneous data.

Health informatics / healthcare information systems: also often refer to software solutions for appointment scheduling, patient data management, work schedule management and other administrative tasks surrounding health

Self-monitoring is the use of sensors or tools which are readily available to the general public to track and record personal data. The sensors are usually wearable devices and the tools are digitally available through mobile device applications. Self-monitoring devices were created for the purpose of allowing personal data to be instantly available to the individual to be analyzed. As of now, fitness and health monitoring are the most popular applications for self-monitoring devices. The biggest benefit to self-monitoring devices is the elimination of the necessity for third party hospitals to run tests, which are both expensive and lengthy. These devices are an important advancement in the field of personal health management.

Health 2.0 refers to the use of a diverse set of technologies including Connected Health, electronic medical records, mHealth, telemedicine, and the use of the Internet by patients themselves such as through blogs, Internet forums, online communities, patient to physician communication systems, and other more advanced systems. A key concept is that patients themselves should have greater insight and control into information generated about them. Additionally Health 2.0 relies on the use of modern cloud and mobile-based technologies.

Much of the potential for change from Health 2.0 is facilitated by combining technology driven trends such as Personal Health Records with social networking —"[which] may lead to a powerful new generation of health applications, where people share parts of their electronic health records with other consumers and 'crowdsource' the collective wisdom of other patients and professionals." Traditional models of medicine had patient records (held on paper or a proprietary computer system) that could only be accessed by a physician or other medical professional. Physicians acted as gatekeepers to this information, telling patients test results when and if they deemed it necessary. Such a model operates relatively well in situations such as acute care, where information about specific blood results would be of little use to a lay person, or in general practice where results were generally benign. However, in the case of complex chronic diseases, psychiatric disorders, or diseases of unknown etiology patients were at risk of being left without well-coordinated care because data about them was stored in a variety of disparate places and in some cases might contain the opinions of healthcare professionals which were not to be shared with the patient. Increasingly, medical ethics deems such actions to be medical paternalism, and they are discouraged in modern medicine.

A hypothetical example demonstrates the increased engagement of a patient operating in a Health 2.0 setting: a patient goes to see their primary care physician with a presenting complaint, having first ensured their own medical record was up to date via the Internet. The treating physician might make a diagnosis or send for tests, the results of which could be transmitted directly to the patient's electronic medical record. If a second appointment is needed, the patient will have had time to research what the results might mean for them, what diagnoses may be likely, and may have communicated with other patients who have had a similar set of results in the past. On a second visit a referral might be made to a specialist. The patient might have the opportunity to search for the views of other patients on the best specialist to go to, and in combination with their primary care physician decides whom to see. The specialist gives a diagnosis along with a prognosis and potential options for treatment. The patient has the opportunity to research these treatment options and take a more proactive role in coming to a joint decision with their healthcare provider. They can also choose to submit more data about themselves, such as through a personalized genomics service to identify any risk factors that might improve or worsen their prognosis. As treatment commences, the patient can track their health outcomes through a data-sharing patient community to determine whether the treatment is having an effect for them, and they can stay up to date on research opportunities and clinical trials for their condition. They also have the social support of communicating with other patients diagnosed with the same condition throughout the world.