Background: More clinical studies use social media to increase recruitment accrual. However, empirical analyses focusing on the ethical aspects pertinent when targeting patients with vulnerable characteristics are lacking.
Objective: This study aims to explore expert and patient perspectives on vulnerability in the context of social media recruitment and seeks to explore how social media can reduce or amplify vulnerabilities.
Methods: As part of an international consortium that tests a therapeutic vaccine against hepatitis B (TherVacB), we conducted 30 qualitative interviews with multidisciplinary experts in social media recruitment (from the fields of clinical research, public relations, psychology, ethics, philosophy, law, and social sciences) about the ethical, legal, and social challenges of social media recruitment. We triangulated the expert assessments with the perceptions of 6 patients with hepatitis B regarding social media usage and attitudes relative to their diagnosis.
Results: Experts perceived social media recruitment as beneficial for reaching hard-to-reach populations and preserving patient privacy. Features that may aggravate existing vulnerabilities are the acontextual point of contact, potential breaches of user privacy, biased algorithms disproportionately affecting disadvantaged groups, and technological barriers such as insufficient digital literacy skills and restricted access to relevant technology. We also report several practical recommendations from experts to navigate these triggering effects of social media recruitment, including transparent communication, addressing algorithm bias, privacy education, and multichannel recruitment.
Conclusions: Using social media for clinical study recruitment can mitigate and aggravate potential study participants' vulnerabilities. Researchers should anticipate and address the outlined triggering effects within this study's design and proactively define strategies to overcome them. We suggest practical recommendations to achieve this.
Background: Good preconception health reduces the incidence of preventable morbidity and mortality for women, their babies, and future generations. In Australia, there is a need to increase health literacy and awareness about the importance of good preconception health. Digital health tools are a possible enabler to increase this awareness at a population level. The Healthy Conception Tool (HCT) is an existing web-based, preconception health self-assessment tool, that has been developed by academics and clinicians.
Objective: This study aims to optimize the HCT and to seek user feedback to increase the engagement and impact of the tool.
Methods: In-depth interviews were held with women and men aged 18-41 years, who spoke and read English and were residing in Australia. Interview transcripts were analyzed, and findings were used to inform an enhanced HCT prototype. This prototype underwent user-experience testing and feedback from users to inform a final round of design changes to the tool.
Results: A total of 20 women and 5 men were interviewed; all wanted a tool that was quick and easy to use with personalized results. Almost all participants were unfamiliar with the term "preconception care" and stated they would not have found this tool on the internet with its current title. User-experience testing with 6 women and 5 men identified 11 usability issues. These informed further changes to the tool's title, the information on how to use the tool, and the presentation of results.
Conclusions: Web-based self-assessment tools need to be easy to find and should communicate health messages effectively. End users' feedback informed changes to improve the tool's acceptability, engagement, and impact. We expect that the revised tool will have greater reach and prompt more people to prepare well for pregnancy.
Background: COVID-19 created an opportunity for using teleconsultation as an alternative way of accessing expert medical advice. Bangladesh has seen a 20-fold increase in the use of teleconsultation during the pandemic.
Objective: The aim of our study was to assess the influence of service quality and user satisfaction on the intention to use teleconsultation in the future among users of national teleconsultation services during the pandemic.
Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted in 2020 among users of the national teleconsultation service-Shastho Batayon for acute respiratory infection. A validated mobile health service quality model based on structural equation modeling and confirmatory factor analysis was used to analyze the data with SmartPLS (version 3.0).
Results: Among the 2097 study participants, 1646 (78.5%) were male, 1416 (67.5%) were aged 18-39 years, 1588 (75.7%) were urban residents, 1348 (64.2%) had more than 10 years of schooling, and 1657 (79%) were from middle-income households. From a consumer perspective, the quality of the service platform (β=.946), service interaction (β=.974), and outcome (β=.955) contributed to service quality. Service quality was positively associated with user satisfaction (β=.327; P<.001) and intention to use teleconsultation services (β=.102; P<.001). User satisfaction was positively associated with the intention to use teleconsultation services (β=.311; P<.001).
Conclusions: The increase in the use of teleconsultation during the pandemic indicated that such services were potentially used for emergencies. However, the future use of teleconsultation will be dependent on the quality of service and user satisfaction. Our findings are relevant for low-income contexts where teleconsultation services are used to address gaps in service delivery.
Background: Dementia management presents a significant challenge for individuals affected by dementia, as well as their families, caregivers, and health care providers. Digital applications may support those living with dementia; however only a few dementia-friendly applications exist.
Objective: This paper emphasizes the necessity of considering multiple perspectives to ensure the high-quality development of supportive health care applications. The findings underscore the importance of incorporating input from stakeholders and the needs of affected families into application development.
Methods: A qualitative approach was chosen, consisting of three interviews and an expert workshop. The interviews and the workshop were recorded and transcribed, and qualitative content analysis was carried out according to the methodology described by Kuckartz with the support of MAXQDA.
Results: During the development phases of the application, team meetings and discussions took place. We found that general practitioners and family caregivers play pivotal roles in the treatment and care of people with dementia, often expressing specific preferences and suggestions regarding supportive and assistive technologies. Moreover, the successful development of a useful tablet application requires robust scientific and multidisciplinary discussions and teamwork within the health care community.
Conclusions: This paper underscores the necessity of including multiple scientific, clinical, and technical perspectives to ensure the high-quality development of supportive health care applications. Furthermore, adopting a spiral development approach inclusive of feedback loops is imperative for iterative refinement and enhancement of the application.
Background: Currently, 30 million children are experiencing acute malnutrition, and 8 million children are severely underweight.
Objective: This study aimed to develop a stunting super app, a one-stop app designed to prevent and manage stunting in Indonesia.
Methods: This study consisted of three stages. Stage 1 used a 3-round Delphi study involving 12 experts. In stage 2, 4 experts and a parent of children with stunted growth created an Android app containing stunting educational materials. In stage 3, a pilot study involving a control group was conducted to evaluate parents' knowledge about stunting prevention through the app and standard interventions.
Results: In the Delphi study, 11 consensus statements were extracted; arranged in three major themes, including maternal health education, child health education, and environmental education; and applied in the form of the Sistem Evaluasi Kesehatan Anak Tumbuh Ideal (SEHATI) app. This app was assessed using a content validity index, with a cumulative agreement of ≥80% among the 5 individuals. The pilot study showed an increase in the knowledge of mothers of toddlers with stunted growth before and after the educational intervention (P=.001).
Conclusions: The SEHATI app provides educational content on stunting prevention that can increase the knowledge of mothers of toddlers with stunted growth.
[This corrects the article DOI: 10.2196/46849.].
Background: Homework is implemented with variable effectiveness in real-world therapy settings, indicating a need for innovative solutions to homework challenges. We developed Adhere.ly, a user-friendly, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act-compliant web-based platform to help therapists implement homework with youth clients and their caregivers. The initial version had limited functionality, was designed for youth clients and their caregivers, and required expanding available features and exercises to suit adult clients.
Objective: The purpose of this study was to better understand barriers and potential solutions to homework implementation experienced by therapists seeing adult clients and obtain their input on new features and exercises that would enable Adhere.ly to better meet their needs when working with this population.
Methods: This study used an exploratory, sequential mixed methods design that included 13 semistructured focus groups with mental health therapists and clinic leaders and a survey administered to 100 therapists. Analyses were performed using the NVivo qualitative analysis software and SPSS.
Results: The findings revealed common barriers, such as clients and therapists being busy, forgetting to complete homework, managing multiple platforms and homework materials, and clients lacking motivation. Adhere.ly was perceived as a potential solution, particularly its user-friendly interface and SMS text-message based reminders. Therapists suggested integrating Adhere.ly with telemedicine and electronic health record platforms and adding more exercises to support manualized therapy protocols and therapy guides.
Conclusions: This study highlights the importance of technology-based solutions in addressing barriers to homework implementation in mental health treatment with adult clients. Adhere.ly shows promise in addressing these challenges and has the potential to improve therapy efficiency and homework completion rates. The input from therapists informed the development of Adhere.ly, guiding the expansion of features and exercises to better meet the needs of therapists working with adult clients.
Background: Emergency nurses actively manage the flow of patients through emergency departments. Patient flow management is complex, cognitively demanding work that shapes the timeliness, efficiency, and safety of patient care. Research exploring nursing patient flow management is limited. A comprehensive analysis of emergency nursing work systems is needed to improve patient flow work processes.
Objective: The aim of this paper is to describe the work system factors that impact emergency nurse patient flow management using the System Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety model.
Methods: This study used grounded theory methodologies. Data were collected through multiple rounds of focus groups and interviews with 27 emergency nurse participants and 64 hours of participant observation across 4 emergency departments between August 2022 and February 2023. Data were analyzed using coding, constant comparative analysis, and memo-writing. Emergent themes were organized according to the first component of the System Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety model, the work system.
Results: Patient flow management is impacted by diverse factors, including personal nursing characteristics; tools and technology; external factors; and the emergency department's physical and socio-organizational environment. Participants raised concerns about the available technology's functionality, usability, and accessibility; departmental capacity and layout; resource levels across the health care system; and interdepartmental teamwork. Other noteworthy findings include obscurity and variability across departments' staff roles titles, functions, and norms; the degree of provider involvement in patient flow management decisions; and management's enforcement of timing metrics.
Conclusions: There are significant barriers to the work of emergency patient flow management. More research is needed to measure the impact of these human factors on patient flow outcomes. Collaboration between health care administrators, human factors engineers, and nurses is needed to improve emergency nurse work systems.