The role of health kiosks in public health

Access to the right information at the right time is a crucial ingredient of modern healthcare. Today، within health kiosks، health information can be accessed in public places. The term kiosk tends to be used for touch screen computer that is normally used standing up in public places. Health kiosk is a system with various capabilities. This is an overview article. Different scientific databases were searched to identify articles published during the period of 1995 to 2013. The information is also gathered from personal observation and oral interview in Tehran. Health kiosks can be utilized for self-management of chronic diseases، reduce health disparities، better outreach of healthcare services and can be a cost effective way to improve delivery of healthcare services. A search performed on health kiosks in Tehran shows a significant difference in a structure and use of it with global ones. One of the main reason is that theses kiosk are independent from ministry of health and medical education. Several variables such as health literacy، lack of culturally adaptive health information and limited availability of tailored health material are some of the existing barriers to greater adoption of health technologies and their impact in the improvement of health outcomes.