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Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics

A number of mobile health apps related to coronavirus infectious disease 2019 (COVID-19) have been developed, but research into app content analytics for effective surveillance and management is still in its preliminary stages. The present study aimed to identify the purpose and functions of the cur...

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Autores principales: Kim, Yeongju, Choi, Jihye, Ji, Young-A, Woo, Hyekyung
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9690054/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36429365
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214652
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author Kim, Yeongju
Choi, Jihye
Ji, Young-A
Woo, Hyekyung
author_facet Kim, Yeongju
Choi, Jihye
Ji, Young-A
Woo, Hyekyung
author_sort Kim, Yeongju
collection PubMed
description A number of mobile health apps related to coronavirus infectious disease 2019 (COVID-19) have been developed, but research into app content analytics for effective surveillance and management is still in its preliminary stages. The present study aimed to identify the purpose and functions of the currently available COVID-19 apps using content analysis. The secondary aim was to propose directions for the future development of apps that aid infectious disease surveillance and control with a focus on enhancing the app content and quality. Prior to conducting an app search in the App Store and the Google Play Store, we reviewed previous studies on COVID-19 apps found in Google Scholar and PubMed to examine the main purposes of the apps. Using the five selected keywords based on the review, we searched the two app stores to retrieve eligible COVID-19 apps including those already addressed in the reviewed literature. We conducted descriptive and content analyses of the selected apps. We classified the purpose types of the COVID-19 apps into the following five categories: Information provision, tracking, monitoring, mental health management, and engagement. We identified 890 apps from the review articles and the app stores: 47 apps met the selection criteria and were included in the content analysis. Among the selected apps, iOS apps outnumbered Android apps, 27 apps were government-developed, and most of the apps were created in the United States. The most common function for the iOS apps (63.6%) and Android apps (62.5%) was to provide COVID-19-related knowledge. The most common function among the tracking apps was to notify users of contact with infected people by the iOS apps (40.9%) and Android apps (37.5%). About 29.5% of the iOS apps and 25.0% of the Android apps were used to record symptoms and self-diagnose. Significantly fewer apps targeted mental health management and engagement. Six iOS apps (6/44, 13.6%) and four Android apps (4/24, 16.7%) provided behavioral guidelines about the pandemic. Two iOS apps (2/44, 4.5%) and two Android apps (2/24, 8.3%) featured communication functions. The present content analysis revealed that most of the apps provided unilateral information and contact tracing or location tracking. Several apps malfunctioned. Future research and development of COVID-19 apps or apps for other emerging infectious diseases should address the quality and functional improvements, which should begin with continuous monitoring and actions to mitigate any technical errors.
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spelling pubmed-96900542022-11-25 Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics Kim, Yeongju Choi, Jihye Ji, Young-A Woo, Hyekyung Int J Environ Res Public Health Review A number of mobile health apps related to coronavirus infectious disease 2019 (COVID-19) have been developed, but research into app content analytics for effective surveillance and management is still in its preliminary stages. The present study aimed to identify the purpose and functions of the currently available COVID-19 apps using content analysis. The secondary aim was to propose directions for the future development of apps that aid infectious disease surveillance and control with a focus on enhancing the app content and quality. Prior to conducting an app search in the App Store and the Google Play Store, we reviewed previous studies on COVID-19 apps found in Google Scholar and PubMed to examine the main purposes of the apps. Using the five selected keywords based on the review, we searched the two app stores to retrieve eligible COVID-19 apps including those already addressed in the reviewed literature. We conducted descriptive and content analyses of the selected apps. We classified the purpose types of the COVID-19 apps into the following five categories: Information provision, tracking, monitoring, mental health management, and engagement. We identified 890 apps from the review articles and the app stores: 47 apps met the selection criteria and were included in the content analysis. Among the selected apps, iOS apps outnumbered Android apps, 27 apps were government-developed, and most of the apps were created in the United States. The most common function for the iOS apps (63.6%) and Android apps (62.5%) was to provide COVID-19-related knowledge. The most common function among the tracking apps was to notify users of contact with infected people by the iOS apps (40.9%) and Android apps (37.5%). About 29.5% of the iOS apps and 25.0% of the Android apps were used to record symptoms and self-diagnose. Significantly fewer apps targeted mental health management and engagement. Six iOS apps (6/44, 13.6%) and four Android apps (4/24, 16.7%) provided behavioral guidelines about the pandemic. Two iOS apps (2/44, 4.5%) and two Android apps (2/24, 8.3%) featured communication functions. The present content analysis revealed that most of the apps provided unilateral information and contact tracing or location tracking. Several apps malfunctioned. Future research and development of COVID-19 apps or apps for other emerging infectious diseases should address the quality and functional improvements, which should begin with continuous monitoring and actions to mitigate any technical errors. MDPI 2022-11-08 /pmc/articles/PMC9690054/ /pubmed/36429365 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214652 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Kim, Yeongju
Choi, Jihye
Ji, Young-A
Woo, Hyekyung
Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title_full Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title_fullStr Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title_full_unstemmed Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title_short Insights from Review and Content Analysis of Current COVID-19 Mobile Apps and Recommendations for Future Pandemics
title_sort insights from review and content analysis of current covid-19 mobile apps and recommendations for future pandemics
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9690054/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36429365
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214652
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