Human-Centred Design of Mobile Health Applications for Older Adults: Systematic Review and Narrative Synthesis (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zethapong Nimmanterdwong ◽  
Suchaya Boonviriya ◽  
Pisit Tangkijvanich

BACKGROUND The world is ageing. The number of older patients rises, and along with it comes the burden of non-communicable diseases both clinical and economic. Attempts with mobile health (mHealth) have been made to remedy the situation with promising outcomes. Researchers have adopted human-centred design (HCD) in mHealth creation to ensure those promises become reality. OBJECTIVE The aim of this systematic review is to explore existing literature to address how human-centred design should be used to create highly usable mHealth applications. METHODS A systematic review was conducted to seek studies of mHealth interventions aimed at older adults with their HCD process explained from the following databases: IEEE Xplore, MEDLINE via Ovid, PubMed, and Scopus. Two independent reviewers then assessed their eligibility: they must be written in English, include participants older than 60 years old, and report about mHealth applications and their HCD development from start to finish. The 2 reviewers continued to assess the included studies’ qualities using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tools (MMAT). A narrative synthesis was then carried out and completed. RESULTS Eight studies passed the eligibility criteria: 5 were mixed methods studies, and 3 were case studies. Some studies were about the same mHealth projects with the total of 5 mHealth applications. The included studies differed in HCD goals, target groups, and details of their HCD methodologies. The HCD process was thematically explored in 4 steps through narrative synthesis according to International Standardisation Organisation (ISO) 9241-210: (1) understand and specify the context of use, (2) specify the user requirements, (3) produce design solutions to meet these requirements, and (4) evaluate the designs against requirements. CONCLUSIONS Challenges and recommendations are summarised logically with structural order and time order based on Minto’s pyramid principle and ISO 9241-210. Findings show that existing literature in the subfield of HCD and mHealth for older adults is still limited. The quality of most included studies is also deemed inadequate as appraised by MMAT. The details of the sampling method are lacking. Also, objective and quantifiable goals of the system are not set, leading to failure in drawing a significant conclusion. More studies of HCD application on mHealth with measurable design goals and rigorous research strategy are warranted.

Author(s):  
Clare Burgon ◽  
Sarah Elizabeth Goldberg ◽  
Veronika van der Wardt ◽  
Catherine Brewin ◽  
Rowan H. Harwood

<b><i>Background:</i></b> Apathy is highly prevalent in dementia and is also seen in mild cognitive impairment and the general population. Apathy contributes to failure to undertake daily activities and can lead to health problems or crises. It is therefore important to assess apathy. However, there is currently no gold standard measure of apathy. A comprehensive systematic review of the measurement properties of apathy scales is required. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> A systematic review was registered with PROSPERO (ID: CRD42018094390). MEDLINE, Embase, PsycINFO, and CINAHL were searched for studies that aimed to develop or assess the validity or reliability of an apathy scale in participants over 65 years, living in the community. A systematic review was conducted in line with the COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health Measurement INstruments procedure for reviewing patient-reported outcome measures. The studies’ risk of bias was assessed, and all relevant measurement properties were assessed for quality. Results were pooled and rated using a modified Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation procedure. <b><i>Results:</i></b> Fifty-seven publications regarding 18 measures and 39 variations met the eligibility criteria. The methodological quality of individual studies ranged from inadequate to very good and measurement properties ranged from insufficient to sufficient. Similarly, the overall evidence for measurement properties ranged from very low to high quality. The Apathy Evaluation Scale (AES) and Lille Apathy Rating Scale (LARS) had sufficient content validity, reliability, construct validity, and where applicable, structural validity and internal consistency. <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> Numerous scales are available to assess apathy, with varying psychometric properties. The AES and LARS are recommended for measuring apathy in older adults and people living with dementia. The apathy dimension of the commonly used Neuropsychiatric Inventory should be limited to screening for apathy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vanashree Sexton ◽  
Jeremy Dale ◽  
Helen Atherton

Abstract Background Telephone-based digital triage is widely used by services that provide urgent care. This involves a call handler or clinician using a digital triage tool to generate algorithm-based care advice, based on a patient’s symptoms. Advice typically takes the form of signposting within defined levels of urgency to specific services or self-care advice. Despite wide adoption, there is limited evaluation of its impact on service user experience, service use and clinical outcomes; no previous systematic reviews have focussed on services that utilise digital triage, and its impact on these outcome areas within urgent care. This review aims to address this need, particularly now that telephone-based digital triage is well established in healthcare delivery. Methods Studies assessing the impact of telephone-based digital triage on service user experience, health care service use and clinical outcomes will be identified through searches conducted in Medline, Embase, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Web of Science and Scopus. Search terms using words relating to digital triage and urgent care settings (excluding in-hours general practice) will be used. The review will include all original study types including qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods studies; studies published in the last 20 years and studies published in English. Quality assessment of studies will be conducted using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT); a narrative synthesis approach will be used to analyse and summarise findings. Discussion This is the first systematic review to evaluate service user experience, service use and clinical outcomes related to the use of telephone-based digital triage in urgent care settings. It will evaluate evidence from studies of wide-ranging designs. The narrative synthesis approach will enable the integration of findings to provide new insights on service delivery. Models of urgent care continue to evolve rapidly, with the emergence of self-triage tools and national help lines. Findings from this review will be presented in a practical format that can feed into the design of digital triage tools, future service design and healthcare policy. Systematic review registration This systematic review is registered on the international database of prospectively registered systematic reviews in health and social care (PROSPERO 2020 CRD42020178500).


10.2196/17776 ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. e17776 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ran Li ◽  
Ning Liang ◽  
Fanlong Bu ◽  
Therese Hesketh

Background Effective treatment of hypertension requires careful self-management. With the ongoing development of mobile technologies and the scarcity of health care resources, mobile health (mHealth)–based self-management has become a useful treatment for hypertension, and its effectiveness has been assessed in many trials. However, there is a paucity of comprehensive summaries of the studies using both qualitative and quantitative methods. Objective This systematic review aimed to measure the effectiveness of mHealth in improving the self-management of hypertension for adults. The outcome measures were blood pressure (BP), BP control, medication adherence, self-management behavior, and costs. Methods A systematic search was conducted using 5 electronic databases. The snowballing method was used to scan the reference lists of relevant studies. Only peer-reviewed randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published between January 2010 and September 2019 were included. Data extraction and quality assessment were performed by 3 researchers independently, adhering to the validation guideline and checklist. Both a meta-analysis and a narrative synthesis were carried out. Results A total of 24 studies with 8933 participants were included. Of these, 23 studies reported the clinical outcome of BP, 12 of these provided systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) data, and 16 articles focused on change in self-management behavior and medication adherence. All 24 studies were included in the narrative synthesis. According to the meta-analysis, a greater reduction in both SBP and DBP was observed in the mHealth intervention groups compared with control groups, −3.78 mm Hg (P<.001; 95% CI −4.67 to −2.89) and −1.57 mm Hg (P<.001; 95% CI −2.28 to −0.86), respectively. Subgroup analyses showed consistent reductions in SBP and DBP across different frequencies of reminders, interactive patterns, intervention functions, and study duration subgroups. A total of 16 studies reported better medication adherence and behavioral change in the intervention groups, while 8 showed no significant change. Six studies included an economic evaluation, which drew inconsistent conclusions. However, potentially long-term financial benefits were mentioned in all economic evaluations. All studies were assessed to be at high risk of bias. Conclusions This review found that mHealth self-management interventions were effective in BP control. The outcomes of this review showed improvements in self-management behavior and medication adherence. The most successful mHealth intervention combined the feature of tailored messages, interactive communication, and multifaceted functions. Further research with longer duration and cultural adaptation is necessary. With increasing disease burden from hypertension globally, mHealth offers a potentially effective method for self-management and control of BP. mHealth can be easily integrated into existing health care systems. Trial Registration PROSPERO CRD42019152062; https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?RecordID=152062


2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (16) ◽  
pp. 996-1002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie K Farlie ◽  
Lauren Robins ◽  
Romi Haas ◽  
Jennifer L Keating ◽  
Elizabeth Molloy ◽  
...  

ObjectiveThe objective of this systematic review was to examine the effects of different balance exercise interventions compared with non-balance exercise controls on balance task performance in older adults.DesignSystematic review.Data sourcesMedline, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, EMBASE, Scopus and Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews were searched until July 2017.Eligibility criteria for selecting studiesSystematic reviews and meta-analyses of randomised trials of balance exercise interventions for older adults were identified for extraction of eligible randomised trials. Eligibility criteria for inclusion of randomised trials in meta-analyses were comparison of a balance exercise intervention with a control group that did not perform balance exercises, report of at least one end-intervention balance outcome measurement that was consistent with the five subgroups of balance exercise identified, and full-text article available in English.ResultsNinety-five trials were included in meta-analyses and 80 in meta-regressions. For four balance exercise types (control centre of mass, multidimensional, mobility and reaching), significant effects for balance exercise interventions were found in meta-analyses (standardised mean difference (SMD) 0.31–0.50), however with considerable heterogeneity in observed effects (I2: 50.4%–80.6%). Risk of bias assessments (Physiotherapy Evidence Database score and funnel plots) did not explain heterogeneity. One significant relationship identified in the meta-regressions of SMD and balance exercise frequency, time and duration explained 2.1% of variance for the control centre of mass subgroup.ConclusionLimitations to this study included the variability in design of balance interventions, incomplete reporting of data and statistical heterogeneity. The design of balance exercise programmes provides inadequate explanation of the observed benefits of these interventions.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Billy Robinson ◽  
Enying Gong ◽  
Brian Oldenburg ◽  
Katharine See

BACKGROUND Asthma is a chronic respiratory disorder defined clinically as a combination of typical respiratory symptoms, and significant variable reversible airflow limitation. In addition to pharmacotherapy, a key aspect of asthma management is empowering patients to manage their condition and recognise and respond to asthma exacerbations. Mobile health applications (mHealth apps) represent a potential medium through which patients could improve the ability to self-manage their asthma. Few studies have conducted a systematic evaluation of both free and paid asthma mobile applications for the quality and functionality of the apps using a validated tool and to our knowledge none have systematically assessed these applications for the quality of information that they provide compared to available international best practice guidelines. This represents the first study that will undertake both of these evaluations for all available mHealth Apps in Australia targeted towards adult asthmatics. The Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) guidelines represent a regularly updated guideline based on reviews of the available scientific literature by an international panel of experts. This review will examine the functionality and quality of available asthma mobile health applications and the consistency of these available applications with recommendations from the GINA guidelines. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study is to conduct a systematic review of adult-targeted asthma mobile health applications on the Australian market. As part of this review the potential for an mHealth app to improve asthma self-management and the overall quality of the application will be evaluated, using the Mobile App Rating Scale (MARS) framework, and the quality of the information within an app, using the current GINA guidelines as a reference, will be assessed. METHODS A methodological stepwise approach was taken in creating this review. First the most recent GINA guidelines were independently reviewed by two authors to identify key recommendations that could feasibly be incorporated into a mHealth app. These identified recommendations were then compared to a previously developed asthma application assessment framework. A modified assessment framework was created, ensuring all of these identified recommendations were included. Two popular App stores were then reviewed to identify potential mHealth Apps and then a screening process based on pre-defined inclusion and exclusion criteria occurred to establish what mHealth Apps would be evaluated. Application evaluation then occurred. Technical information was obtained from publicly available information on the application store or within the app itself. The next step was to perform an application quality assessment using the validated MARS framework to objectively determine the quality of the application. Application functionality was then assessed using the IMS Institute for Health Informatics Functionality Scoring system. Finally, the mHealth applications will be assessed using a checklist that we have developed based on what was identified from the international GINA guidelines. RESULTS To date, funding has been received for the project from the Respiratory Department at Northern Health, Victoria. Three reviewers have been recruited to systematically evaluate the applications. Results for this study are expected by the end of this year. CONCLUSIONS Nil as protocol CLINICALTRIAL PROSPERO 269894


Author(s):  
Murtaja Ali Saare ◽  
Azham Hussain ◽  
Wong Seng Yue

This article examines the link between the older adult’s cognitive decline, and Assistive Mobile Health Applications in terms of quality of life as researcher has found scarcity in explaining the mediating role of assistive mobile health applications towards the quality of life of older adults with cognitive decline. Researchers have identified the importance of using assistive mobile health applications in connection of the older adult’s cognitive decline. However, it remained unaddressed in the explaining the mediating role of assistive mobile health application. Therefore, this paper aims to provide an insight that the adoption of assistive m-health applications will provide this population with potential solution to their challenging aging life, hence, enhancing their quality of life. In addition, this paper is only a conceptual explanation, as it aims to identify the possible reasons that influence their Smartphone adoption. Factors were identified using a systematic literature review on relevant peer reviewed papers. The study summarized the empirical evidences which were used to support the conceptual explanation. It is expected that this work will lead towards the empirical findings on the explanation of the mediating role of the assistive mobile health applications to address the relationship of older adult’s cognitive decline and quality of life. This paper providesdirections for future studies in improving the quality of life of older adults.


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