Interaction Empowerment in Mobile Health: Concepts, Challenges, and Perspectives

Abstract

In its most trending interpretation, empowerment in health care is implemented as a patient-centered approach. In the same sense, many mobile health (mHealth) apps are being developed with a primary focus on the individual user. The integration of mHealth apps into the health care system has the potential to counteract existing challenges, including incomplete or nonstandardized medical data and lack of communication, especially in the intersectional context (eg, patients, medical forces). However, concerns about data security and privacy, regional differences in regulations, lack of accessibility, and nontransparent apps hinder the successful integration of mHealth into the health care system. One approach to address this is to rethink the interpretation of empowerment. On that basis, we here examine existing approaches of individual empowerment and subsequently analyze a different view of empowerment in digital health, namely interaction empowerment. Such a change of perspective could positively influence intersectoral communication and facilitate secure data and knowledge sharing. We discuss this novel viewpoint on empowerment, focusing on more efficient integration and development of mHealth approaches. A renewed interpretation of empowerment could thus buffer current limitations of individual empowerment while also advancing digitization of the health system.

Keywords: digital health; health care network; interaction empowerment; intersectoral communication; mHealth; mobile apps; patient empowerment; patient-doctor relationship.

Figure 1

Major challenges in the current health care system. IT: information technology.

Figure 2

Three main classes of barriers in designing mobile health apps as categorized by Schreiweis et al [31]. For each larger class, subboxes including specific issues are depicted. Boxes with solid borders represent barriers mentioned by Schreiweis et al [31]. Additional or more detailed hurdles we collected from the literature are highlighted by dashed lines [11-20]. The size of the boxes does not represent their relevance or severity. AI: artificial intelligence.

Figure 3

Representation of the modern health care network. Each node represents a relevant group of individuals interacting within this network with other individuals. Connecting edges represent these possible interactions. Even though there are more actors in the existing health care system, we merely included the groups we evaluated to be the most relevant for the concept of empowerment. HCP: health care provider.

Figure 4

Four examples of possible subnetworks in the modern health care network. Each node represents a relevant role (ie, individual or group) and the connecting edges represent relevant interactions in the underlying subnetwork. The top left caption describes the interaction’s main aim. HCP: health care provider.