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Shaker AA, Austin SF, Jørgensen MS, Sørensen JA, Bechmann H, Kinnerup HE, Petersen CJ, Olsen RK, Simonsen E. Facilitating In-House Mobile App Development Within Psychiatric Outpatient Services for Patients Diagnosed With Borderline Personality Disorder: Rapid Application Development Approach. JMIR Hum Factors 2023; 10:e46928. [PMID: 38032709 PMCID: PMC10722361 DOI: 10.2196/46928] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/02/2023] [Revised: 07/31/2023] [Accepted: 09/23/2023] [Indexed: 12/01/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Mobile app development within mental health is often time- and resource-consuming, challenging the development of mobile apps for psychiatry. There is a continuum of software development methods ranging from linear (waterfall model) to continuous adaption (Scrum). Rapid application development (RAD) is a model that so far has not been applied to psychiatric settings and may have some advantages over other models. OBJECTIVE This study aims to explore the utility of the RAD model in developing a mobile app for patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) in a psychiatric outpatient setting. METHODS The 4 phases of the RAD model: (1) requirements planning, (2) user design, (3) construction, and (4) cutover, were applied to develop a mobile app within psychiatric outpatient services for patients diagnosed with BPD. RESULTS For the requirements planning phase, a short time frame was selected to minimize the time between product conceptualization and access within a clinical setting. Evidenced-based interactive content already developed was provided by current staff to enhance usability and trustworthiness. For the user design phase, activity with video themes and a discrete number of functions were used to improve the app functionality and graphical user interface. For the construction phase, close collaboration between clinicians, researchers, and software developers yielded a fully functional, in-house-developed app ready to be tested in clinical practice. For the cutover phase, the mobile app was tested successfully with a small number (n=5) of patients with a BPD. CONCLUSIONS The RAD model could be meaningfully applied in a psychiatric setting to develop an app for BPD within a relatively short time period from conceptualization to implementation in the clinic. Short time frames and identifying a limited number of stakeholders with relevant skills in-house facilitated the use of this model. Despite some limitations, RAD could be a useful model in the development of apps for clinical populations to enable development and access to evidence-based technology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ali Abbas Shaker
- Psychiatric Research Unit, Psychiatric Department, Region Zealand Psychiatry, Slagelse, Denmark
- Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Stephen F Austin
- Psychiatric Research Unit, Psychiatric Department, Region Zealand Psychiatry, Slagelse, Denmark
- Department of Psychology, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark
| | - Mie Sedoc Jørgensen
- Psychiatric Research Unit, Psychiatric Department, Region Zealand Psychiatry, Slagelse, Denmark
| | - John Aasted Sørensen
- Research Unit: AI, Mathematics and Software, Department of Engineering Technology and Didactics, Technical University of Denmark, Ballerup, Denmark
| | - Henrik Bechmann
- Research Unit: AI, Mathematics and Software, Department of Engineering Technology and Didactics, Technical University of Denmark, Ballerup, Denmark
| | | | - Charlotte Juul Petersen
- Mental Health Services South, Copenhagen University Hospital, Psychiatry Region Zealand, Vordingborg, Denmark
| | - Ragnar Klein Olsen
- Psychiatric Research Unit, Psychiatric Department, Region Zealand Psychiatry, Slagelse, Denmark
| | - Erik Simonsen
- Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Mental Health Services East, Copenhagen University Hospital, Psychiatry Region Zealand, Roskilde, Denmark
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Mousavi S, Tannenbaum Greenberg D, Ndjaboué R, Greiver M, Drescher O, Chipenda Dansokho S, Boutin D, Chouinard JM, Dostie S, Fenton R, Greenberg M, McGavock J, Najam A, Rekik M, Weisz T, Willison DJ, Durand A, Witteman HO. The Influence of Age, Sex, and Socioeconomic Status on Glycemic Control Among People With Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes in Canada: Patient-Led Longitudinal Retrospective Cross-sectional Study With Multiple Time Points of Measurement. JMIR Diabetes 2023; 8:e35682. [PMID: 37104030 PMCID: PMC10176138 DOI: 10.2196/35682] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/10/2022] [Revised: 10/14/2022] [Accepted: 10/15/2022] [Indexed: 04/28/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Clinical guidelines for most adults with diabetes recommend maintaining hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) levels ≤7% (≤53 mmol/mol) to avoid microvascular and macrovascular complications. People with diabetes of different ages, sexes, and socioeconomic statuses may differ in their ease of attaining this goal. OBJECTIVE As a team of people with diabetes, researchers, and health professionals, we aimed to explore patterns in HbA1c results among people with type 1 or type 2 diabetes in Canada. Our research question was identified by people living with diabetes. METHODS In this patient-led retrospective cross-sectional study with multiple time points of measurement, we used generalized estimating equations to analyze the associations of age, sex, and socioeconomic status with 947,543 HbA1c results collected from 2010 to 2019 among 90,770 people living with type 1 or type 2 diabetes in Canada and housed in the Canadian National Diabetes Repository. People living with diabetes reviewed and interpreted the results. RESULTS HbA1c results ≤7.0% represented 30.5% (male people living with type 1 diabetes), 21% (female people living with type 1 diabetes), 55% (male people living with type 2 diabetes) and 59% (female people living with type 2 diabetes) of results in each subcategory. We observed higher HbA1c values during adolescence, and for people living with type 2 diabetes, among people living in lower income areas. Among those with type 1 diabetes, female people tended to have lower HbA1c levels than male people during childbearing years but higher HbA1c levels than male people during menopausal years. Team members living with diabetes confirmed that the patterns we observed reflected their own life courses and suggested that these results be communicated to health professionals and other stakeholders to improve the treatment for people living with diabetes. CONCLUSIONS A substantial proportion of people with diabetes in Canada may need additional support to reach or maintain the guideline-recommended glycemic control goals. Blood sugar management goals may be particularly challenging for people going through adolescence or menopause or those living with fewer financial resources. Health professionals should be aware of the challenging nature of glycemic management, and policy makers in Canada should provide more support for people with diabetes to live healthy lives.
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Affiliation(s)
- Seyedmostafa Mousavi
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- VITAM Research Centre in Sustainable Health, Québec, QC, Canada
- Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
| | | | - Ruth Ndjaboué
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Centre de recherche sur le Vieillissement, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada
- School of Social Work, Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada
| | - Michelle Greiver
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Family and Community Medicine, North York General Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Family and Community Medicine, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | | | - Selma Chipenda Dansokho
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Office of Education and Professional Development, Faculty of Medicine, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
| | - Denis Boutin
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Centre de recherche du CHUS, Sherbrooke, QC, Canada
| | | | | | - Robert Fenton
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- National Indigenous Diabetes Association, Winnipeg, MB, Canada
| | | | - Jonathan McGavock
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Pediatrics and Child Health, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada
| | | | - Monia Rekik
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Operations and Decision Systems, Faculty of Business Administration, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
- Cardiometabolic Health, Diabetes and Obesity Research Network (CMDO), Sherbrooke, QC, Canada
- Interuniversity Research Centre of Enterprise Networks (CIRRELT), Montréal, QC, Canada
| | - Tom Weisz
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Wounds Canada, North York, ON, Canada
- Diabetes Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Donald J Willison
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Audrey Durand
- Canada CIFAR AI Chair, Québec, QC, Canada
- Institute Intelligence and Data, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
- Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
- Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Québec, QC, Canada
| | - Holly O Witteman
- Diabetes Action Canada, Toronto, ON, Canada
- VITAM Research Centre in Sustainable Health, Québec, QC, Canada
- Office of Education and Professional Development, Faculty of Medicine, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
- Department of Family and Emergency Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Université Laval, Québec, QC, Canada
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Meskó B, deBronkart D. Patient Design: The Importance of Including Patients in Designing Health Care. J Med Internet Res 2022; 24:e39178. [PMID: 36044250 PMCID: PMC9475404 DOI: 10.2196/39178] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/02/2022] [Revised: 08/17/2022] [Accepted: 08/19/2022] [Indexed: 01/29/2023] Open
Abstract
A paradigm shift is underway in the patient-clinician relationship, driven by irreversible changes in information access, yet the model under which clinicians are trained, care is conducted, and care delivery is designed has not changed significantly even though we call it “patient centered.” Humanity endured centuries in which even doctors had little idea what the patient’s problem really was. Science slowly solved that, and for a century, only doctors could know what was worth knowing. Today, the rise of the internet and digital health has led to the end of that era. We are already witnessing early signs of the era of participatory health: genuinely empowered people living their lives and managing their health according to their own priorities, in partnership and consultation with physicians as needed. This may feel like a threat to the physician’s sacred role, but it is no more so than when physicians adopted informed consent and then shared decision-making. In the 2010s, many pharmaceutical, medical, and health care companies started to use patient centricity as a mantra. We argue that to drive this paradigm change fully into existence, we need to shift “patient centricity” from a relatively passive process, driven by industry needs, into a far more active, collaborative process driven by both parties’ needs and preferences. To build this new world of practice and workflow, we simply must engage with patients as true partners. To achieve medicine’s new potential, it must be optimized around the wants and priorities of the ultimate stakeholder—the party that has the most at stake in how it all plays out: the patient. Patient design is the approach that can make it happen.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bertalan Meskó
- The Medical Futurist Institute, Budapest, Hungary.,Department of Behavioural Sciences, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Dave deBronkart
- e-Patient Dave, LLC, Boston, MA, United States.,Society for Participatory Medicine, Nutting Lake, MA, United States
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Klebbe R, Scherzinger S, Eicher C. Assistive Robots for Patients With Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis: Exploratory Task-Based Evaluation Study With an Early-Stage Demonstrator. JMIR Rehabil Assist Technol 2022; 9:e35304. [PMID: 35998031 PMCID: PMC9449829 DOI: 10.2196/35304] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2021] [Revised: 05/25/2022] [Accepted: 06/10/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Although robotic manipulators have great potential in promoting motor independence of people with motor impairments, only few systems are currently commercially available. In addition to technical, economic, and normative barriers, a key challenge for their distribution is the current lack of evidence regarding their usefulness, acceptance, and user-specific requirements. Objective Against this background, a semiautonomous robot system was developed in the research and development project, robot-assisted services for individual and resource-oriented intensive and palliative care of people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ROBINA), to support people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in various everyday activities. Methods The developed early-stage demonstrator was evaluated in a task-based laboratory study of 11 patients with ALS. On the basis of a multimethod design consisting of standardized questionnaires, open-ended questions, and observation protocols, participants were asked about its relevance to everyday life, usability, and design requirements. Results Most participants considered the system to provide relevant support within the test scenarios and for their everyday life. On the basis of the System Usability Scale, the overall usability of the robot-assisted services for individual and resource-oriented intensive and palliative care of people with ALS system was rated as excellent, with a median of 90 (IQR 75-95) points. Moreover, 3 central areas of requirements for the development of semiautonomous robotic manipulators were identified and discussed: requirements for semiautonomous human-robot collaboration, requirements for user interfaces, and requirements for the adaptation of robotic capabilities regarding everyday life. Conclusions Robotic manipulators can contribute to increase the autonomy of people with ALS. A key issue for future studies is how the existing ability level and the required robotic capabilities can be balanced to ensure both high user satisfaction and effective and efficient task performance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robert Klebbe
- Department of Geriatrics and Medical Gerontology, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| | | | - Cornelia Eicher
- Department of Geriatrics and Medical Gerontology, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
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Mariakakis A, Karkar R, Patel SN, Kientz JA, Fogarty J, Munson SA. Using Health Concept Surveying to Elicit Usable Evidence: Case Studies of a Novel Evaluation Methodology. JMIR Hum Factors 2022; 9:e30474. [PMID: 34982038 PMCID: PMC8764610 DOI: 10.2196/30474] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/16/2021] [Revised: 09/15/2021] [Accepted: 10/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Developers, designers, and researchers use rapid prototyping methods to project the adoption and acceptability of their health intervention technology (HIT) before the technology becomes mature enough to be deployed. Although these methods are useful for gathering feedback that advances the development of HITs, they rarely provide usable evidence that can contribute to our broader understanding of HITs. OBJECTIVE In this research, we aim to develop and demonstrate a variation of vignette testing that supports developers and designers in evaluating early-stage HIT designs while generating usable evidence for the broader research community. METHODS We proposed a method called health concept surveying for untangling the causal relationships that people develop around conceptual HITs. In health concept surveying, investigators gather reactions to design concepts through a scenario-based survey instrument. As the investigator manipulates characteristics related to their HIT, the survey instrument also measures proximal cognitive factors according to a health behavior change model to project how HIT design decisions may affect the adoption and acceptability of an HIT. Responses to the survey instrument were analyzed using path analysis to untangle the causal effects of these factors on the outcome variables. RESULTS We demonstrated health concept surveying in 3 case studies of sensor-based health-screening apps. Our first study (N=54) showed that a wait time incentive could influence more people to go see a dermatologist after a positive test for skin cancer. Our second study (N=54), evaluating a similar application design, showed that although visual explanations of algorithmic decisions could increase participant trust in negative test results, the trust would not have been enough to affect people's decision-making. Our third study (N=263) showed that people might prioritize test specificity or sensitivity depending on the nature of the medical condition. CONCLUSIONS Beyond the findings from our 3 case studies, our research uses the framing of the Health Belief Model to elicit and understand the intrinsic and extrinsic factors that may affect the adoption and acceptability of an HIT without having to build a working prototype. We have made our survey instrument publicly available so that others can leverage it for their own investigations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alex Mariakakis
- Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Ravi Karkar
- School of Computer Science & Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Shwetak N Patel
- School of Computer Science & Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Julie A Kientz
- Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - James Fogarty
- School of Computer Science & Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Sean A Munson
- Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
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Bravo CA, Llovet D, Witteman HO, Desveaux L, Presseau J, Saragosa M, Vaisson G, Umar S, Tinmouth J, Ivers NM. Designing Emails Aimed at Increasing Family Physicians' Use of a Web-Based Audit and Feedback Tool to Improve Cancer Screening Rates: Cocreation Process. JMIR Hum Factors 2018; 5:e25. [PMID: 30181108 PMCID: PMC6231866 DOI: 10.2196/humanfactors.9875] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/18/2018] [Revised: 05/25/2018] [Accepted: 06/18/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Providing clinical performance data to health professionals, a process known as audit and feedback, can play an important role in health system improvement. However, audit and feedback tools can only be effective if the targeted health professionals access and actively review their data. Email is used by Cancer Care Ontario, a provincial cancer agency, to promote access to a Web-based audit and feedback tool called the Screening Activity Report (SAR); however, current emails that lack behavior change content have been ineffective at encouraging log-in to the SAR. OBJECTIVE The objective of our study was to describe the process and experience of developing email content that incorporates user input and behavior change techniques (BCTs) to promote the use of the SAR among Ontario primary care providers. METHODS Our interdisciplinary research team first identified BCTs shown to be effective in other settings that could be adapted to promote use of the SAR. We then developed draft BCT-informed email content. Next, we conducted cocreation workshops with physicians who had logged in to the SAR more than once over the past year. Participants provided reactions to researcher-developed BCT-informed content and helped to develop an email that they believed would prompt their colleagues to use the SAR. Content from cocreation workshops was brought to focus groups with physicians who had not used the SAR in the past year. We analyzed notes from the cocreation workshops and focus groups to inform decisions about content. Finally, 8 emails were created to test BCT-informed content in a 2×2×2 factorial randomized experiment. RESULTS We identified 3 key tensions during the development of the email that required us to balance user input with scientific evidence, organizational policies, and our scientific objectives, which are as follows: conflict between user preference and scientific evidence, privacy constraints around personalizing unencrypted emails with performance data, and using cocreation methods in a study with the objective of developing an email that featured BCT-informed content. CONCLUSIONS Teams tasked with developing content to promote health professional engagement with audit and feedback or other quality improvement tools might consider cocreation processes for developing communications that are informed by both users and BCTs. Teams should be cautious about making decisions solely based on user reactions because what users seem to prefer is not always the same as what works. Furthermore, implementing user recommendations may not always be feasible. Teams may face challenges when using cocreation methods to develop a product with the simultaneous goal of having clearly defined variables to test in later studies. The expected role of users, evidence, and the implementation context all warrant consideration to determine whether and how cocreation methods could help to achieve design and scientific objectives.
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Affiliation(s)
- Caroline A Bravo
- Prevention and Cancer Control, Cancer Care Ontario, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Diego Llovet
- Prevention and Cancer Control, Cancer Care Ontario, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Institute of Health Policy, Management, and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Holly O Witteman
- Department of Family and Emergency Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Laval University, Quebec City, QC, Canada.,Office of Education and Professional Development, Faculty of Medicine, Laval University, Quebec City, QC, Canada.,Research Centre of the CHU de Québec, Quebec City, QC, Canada
| | - Laura Desveaux
- Institute of Health Policy, Management, and Evaluation, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Women's College Research Institute, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Institute for Health System Solutions and Virtual Care, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Justin Presseau
- Clinical Epidemiology Program, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, ON, Canada.,School of Epidemiology and Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada.,School of Psychology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada
| | - Marianne Saragosa
- Institute for Health System Solutions and Virtual Care, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Family Practice Health Centre, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Gratianne Vaisson
- Office of Education and Professional Development, Faculty of Medicine, Laval University, Quebec City, QC, Canada.,Research Centre of the CHU de Québec, Quebec City, QC, Canada
| | - Shama Umar
- Prevention and Cancer Control, Cancer Care Ontario, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Jill Tinmouth
- Prevention and Cancer Control, Cancer Care Ontario, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Sunnybrook Research Institute, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Noah M Ivers
- Women's College Research Institute, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Institute for Health System Solutions and Virtual Care, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Family Practice Health Centre, Women's College Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Department of Family and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
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Norman CD, Haresign H, Mehling C, Bloomberg H. Exploring the Feasibility and Potential of Virtual Panels for Soliciting Feedback on Nutrition Education Materials: A Proof-of-Concept Study. JMIR Public Health Surveill 2016; 2:e18. [PMID: 27227153 PMCID: PMC4869232 DOI: 10.2196/publichealth.5134] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2015] [Revised: 02/03/2016] [Accepted: 02/04/2016] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Background A changing and cluttered information landscape has put pressure on health organizations to produce consumer information materials that are not only factual but high quality and engaging to audiences. User-centered design methods can be useful in obtaining feedback from consumers; however, they are labor intensive and slow, which is not responsive to the fast-paced communication landscape influenced by social media. EatRight Ontario (ERO), a provincial nutrition and health support program of Dietitians of Canada, develops evidence-based resources for consumers and sought to increase user-centered design activities by exploring whether the standard approach to feedback could be replicated online. While online feedback has been used in marketing research, few examples are available in health promotion and public health to guide programming and policy. Objective This study compared a traditional in-person approach for recruitment and feedback using paper surveys with an Internet-based approach using Facebook as a recruitment tool and collecting user feedback via the Web. The purpose of the proof-of-concept study was to explore the feasibility of the approach and compare an online versus traditional approach in terms of recruitment issues and response. Methods An exploratory, two-group comparative trial was conducted using a convenience and purposive sampling. Participants reviewed a handout on healthy eating and then completed an 18-item survey with both forced-choice items and open-ended responses. One group viewed a hard-copy prototype and completed a paper survey and the other viewed a PDF prototype via Web links and completed a Web survey. The total days required to fulfill the sample for each group were used as the primary method of efficiency calculation. Results In total, 44 participants (22 per condition) completed the study, consisting of 42 women and 2 men over the age of 18. Few significant differences were detected between the groups. Statistically significant (P≤.05) differences were detected on four attitudinal variables related to the document reviewed and include perceived length of the document, perceived attractiveness, likelihood of contacting ERO for food and nutrition questions in the future, and likelihood of recommending ERO to a friend. In all cases, the responses were more favorable to the document or ERO with the online group. All other variables showed no difference between them. A content review of the qualitative feedback found relative consistency in word use and number of words used, indicating relative parity in the amount of data generated between conditions. The online condition achieved its sampling target in 9 days, while the in-person method took 79 days to achieve the target. Conclusions An online process of recruitment through Facebook and solicitation of online feedback is a feasible model that yields comparable response levels to in-person methods for user feedback. The online approach appears to be a faster and less resource-intensive approach than traditional in-person methods for feedback generation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cameron D Norman
- Cense Research + DesignToronto, ONCanada; Social & Behavioural Sciences DivisionDalla Lana School of Public HealthUniversity of TorontoToronto, ONCanada
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