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. 2020 Nov/Dec;37(6):359-367.
doi: 10.1177/1043454220938341. Epub 2020 Jul 10.

User-Centered App Design for Acutely Ill Children and Adolescents

Jacqueline Vaughn  1 , Nirmish Shah  2 , Jude Jonassaint  3 , Nichol Harris  2 , Sharron Docherty  1 , Ryan Shaw  1
Affiliations

User-Centered App Design for Acutely Ill Children and Adolescents

Jacqueline Vaughn et al. J Pediatr Oncol Nurs. 2020 Nov/Dec.

Abstract

Background and Objectives: The high level of acceptance and consistent use of smartphones by children and adolescents present new opportunities to monitor and collect health data. For acutely ill children and adolescents, collecting symptom data via smartphone applications (apps) provides patient-reported data that can be collected daily and offers the potential to provide a more comprehensive picture of the symptom experience. The purpose of this study was to employ user-centered design principles and medical professional input in order to obtain feedback and insight into redesigning our Technology Recordings for better Understanding Blood and Marrow Transplant (TRU-PBMT) app. This redesigned app will be used for children and adolescents with cancer or undergoing blood and marrow transplantation. Method: We interviewed six pediatric blood and marrow transplant patients (ages 10-17 years) who had pilot tested the app, and we surveyed 30 pediatric oncology clinicians. Results: Interview feedback from previous app users and survey feedback from clinicians guided the app redesign. We incorporated suggestions to make the app more engaging, meaningful, personal, and motivating in order to increase symptom reporting. We added emojis to the symptom tracker, a mood scale, and personalized symptom graphs. Conclusion: Leveraging mobile health technologies may be a useful and acceptable approach to obtain symptom data; however, design and software development needs to be evidenced-based and informed by user needs. Our approach using patient and clinician feedback was valuable in the redesign of the TRU-PBMT app and will contribute to symptom research for acutely ill children and adolescents.

Keywords: emoji; mobile technology; symptoms; user-centered design.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared the following potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Jude Jonassaint is a co-owner of Sicklesoft, the app development company. Nirmish Shah is a consultant in pharmaceutical company Novartis, a speaker, and a researcher. All other authors have no conflicts of interest relevant to this article to disclose.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Symptom tracking. Symptom occurrence can be recorded either through emoji or through text, intensities are recorded on a visual analogue scale (0-10), information related to symptom status can be recorded, and interventions used for symptom management can be recorded.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Line charts displaying symptom trends over 12 days.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
The first page of the app is the Health page, which prominently displays daily care goals. Users can earn a gold star as a reward for completing goals. The page also reminds users to do something fun and relaxing each day.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Mood tracker: Mood (happy, angry, sad, tired, and worried) and the intensity on a scale from 0-10 can be recorded each day.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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