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Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups

BACKGROUND: Mobile applications have the potential to assist patients and caregivers in managing chronic diseases, but current offerings are typically limited to a single disease or only focused on patients. A multifaceted app could expand the user base and provide more comprehensive support for pat...

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Autores principales: Fernández, César, Vicente, María Asunción, Guilabert, Mercedes, Carrillo, Irene, Mira, José Joaquín
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10621305/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37928329
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20552076231210662
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author Fernández, César
Vicente, María Asunción
Guilabert, Mercedes
Carrillo, Irene
Mira, José Joaquín
author_facet Fernández, César
Vicente, María Asunción
Guilabert, Mercedes
Carrillo, Irene
Mira, José Joaquín
author_sort Fernández, César
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Mobile applications have the potential to assist patients and caregivers in managing chronic diseases, but current offerings are typically limited to a single disease or only focused on patients. A multifaceted app could expand the user base and provide more comprehensive support for patients who usually suffer from diverse chronic conditions at the same time and their caregivers. OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to design, develop, and evaluate a mobile application that could aid chronic patients and their caregivers in managing the range of chronic conditions. METHODS: Focus group meetings were conducted with patients and caregivers to identify their needs, which were translated into app functionalities. The final version of the app was evaluated through a survey and analysis of the most used features. RESULTS: Five focus group (FG) meetings were held, involving 39 patients and 22 caregivers. The app included medication aids, self-monitoring aids, activation reminders, messages for caregiver shifts, remote monitoring, medicine management, and informative videos. Testing by 65 patients revealed that medication reminders (96.8% positive responses), medicine information (96.8%), messages for caregiver shifts (90.3%), and ease of use (80.6%) were the most valued aspects. The most frequently used feature was the health data record check. CONCLUSIONS: A multifaceted mobile application can address the needs of a variety of chronic patients and their caregivers, while still being easy to use. The app's most used functionalities were aligned with the needs expressed in the FG, which reflects the success of this study and suggests that future research could benefit from incorporating similar user-centered design methodologies.
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spelling pubmed-106213052023-11-03 Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups Fernández, César Vicente, María Asunción Guilabert, Mercedes Carrillo, Irene Mira, José Joaquín Digit Health Original Research BACKGROUND: Mobile applications have the potential to assist patients and caregivers in managing chronic diseases, but current offerings are typically limited to a single disease or only focused on patients. A multifaceted app could expand the user base and provide more comprehensive support for patients who usually suffer from diverse chronic conditions at the same time and their caregivers. OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to design, develop, and evaluate a mobile application that could aid chronic patients and their caregivers in managing the range of chronic conditions. METHODS: Focus group meetings were conducted with patients and caregivers to identify their needs, which were translated into app functionalities. The final version of the app was evaluated through a survey and analysis of the most used features. RESULTS: Five focus group (FG) meetings were held, involving 39 patients and 22 caregivers. The app included medication aids, self-monitoring aids, activation reminders, messages for caregiver shifts, remote monitoring, medicine management, and informative videos. Testing by 65 patients revealed that medication reminders (96.8% positive responses), medicine information (96.8%), messages for caregiver shifts (90.3%), and ease of use (80.6%) were the most valued aspects. The most frequently used feature was the health data record check. CONCLUSIONS: A multifaceted mobile application can address the needs of a variety of chronic patients and their caregivers, while still being easy to use. The app's most used functionalities were aligned with the needs expressed in the FG, which reflects the success of this study and suggests that future research could benefit from incorporating similar user-centered design methodologies. SAGE Publications 2023-11-01 /pmc/articles/PMC10621305/ /pubmed/37928329 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20552076231210662 Text en © The Author(s) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Original Research
Fernández, César
Vicente, María Asunción
Guilabert, Mercedes
Carrillo, Irene
Mira, José Joaquín
Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title_full Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title_fullStr Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title_full_unstemmed Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title_short Developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: Insights from focus groups
title_sort developing a mobile health app for chronic illness management: insights from focus groups
topic Original Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10621305/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37928329
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/20552076231210662
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