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- Title
Characteristics of Chinese m-Health Applications for Diabetes Self-Management.
- Authors
Nie, Lisa; Xie, Bo; Yang, Yan; Shan, Yan Min
- Abstract
Purpose: To examine the features and types of health information provided in Chinese diabetes mobile applications (apps) for patients' self-management. Materials and Methods: Through multiple rounds of screening, we identified a total of 95 relevant iOS (Apple, Cupertino, CA) and Androidâ„¢ (Google, Mountain View, CA) apps and examined each app's features and health information types based on each app's description in the app stores. We used a 15-feature algorithm to evaluate the apps' abilities for supporting diabetic patients' self-management, based on U.S. national standards for diabetes self-management. We also adapted the health information wants framework to analyze the types of information that the apps provided for diabetic patients. Results: Diabetes education was the most common feature, provided by 75% of the apps. Blood glucose checking was enabled by 65% of the apps. Diet management, insulin checking, and physical activity monitoring were enabled by 53%, 49%, and 44% of the apps, respectively. Only a small percentage of the apps enabled psychosocial support (29%) or tracking of blood pressure (14%), cholesterol (14%), or body mass index (11%). None of the apps provided all seven types of information posited by the health information wants framework. Only a small percentage of the apps provided information about psychosocial support (29%), healthcare providers (24%), or healthcare facilities (24%). Information about complementary and alternative medicine was the least likely type of information provided in the apps, with only 7% of the apps providing this type of information. Conclusions: Our findings have important implications for improving the quality of Chinese diabetes mobile apps to facilitate patients' self-management.
- Subjects
DIABETES; MOBILE apps; APPLICATION software; TELEMEDICINE; MEDICAL telematics
- Publication
Telemedicine & e-Health, 2016, Vol 22, Issue 7, p614
- ISSN
1530-5627
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1089/tmj.2015.0184