Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Apr 24:12:e57342.
doi: 10.2196/57342.

Usability and User Experience Testing of a Co-Designed Electronic Patient-Reported Outcomes App ("MyPal for Adults") for Palliative Cancer Care: Mixed Methods Study

Panos Bonotis  1   2 , Pantelis Angelidis  2 , Pantelis Natsiavas  1
Affiliations

Usability and User Experience Testing of a Co-Designed Electronic Patient-Reported Outcomes App ("MyPal for Adults") for Palliative Cancer Care: Mixed Methods Study

Panos Bonotis et al. JMIR Hum Factors. .

Abstract

Background: Mobile health technologies have the potential to enhance the management, communication, and overall quality of life of patients with cancer. The MyPal project, using a participatory design approach, aims to provide palliative care support for patients with cancer through an electronic patient-reported outcomes eHealth platform.

Objective: This study aims to evaluate the usability and user experience of "MyPal for adults," a co-designed palliative care mobile app designed to support adults with cancer.

Methods: Representative users participated in a 4-step usability study using a "think-aloud" protocol, complemented with feature satisfaction, difficulty perceived, and design impression surveys along with a short, structured interview. Participants were also asked to provide quantitative feedback via the postuse System Usability Scale, User Experience Questionnaire, and Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire. The data were analyzed along the lines of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 9241-210 framework.

Results: All participants found the intervention content useful, and they reported satisfactory usability, with a mean Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire score of 2.458 (SD 1.08) and a System Usability Scale score of 68.9. All aspects of the User Experience Questionnaire (attractiveness, perspicuity, efficiency, dependability, stimulation, and novelty) surpassed usability quality benchmarks. The qualitative analysis identified 43 usability issues, primarily related to effectiveness and efficiency as defined in ISO 9241-210.

Conclusions: In this study, we conducted a usability evaluation of the "MyPal for adults" app, a digital tool designed to enhance the palliative care experience. This approach identifies real-world usability issues, enabling iterative improvements in the eHealth platform's design. Our findings reveal a user-friendly interface and positive patient experiences. This study emphasizes the need to enhance mobile health platform usability, offering insights to improve digital palliative care.

Keywords: app; cancer care; digital intervention; mHealth; mobile health; mobile phone; palliative care; patient-reported outcomes; think-aloud test; usability evaluation.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest: None declared.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. The MyPal mobile app for adult patients: login page, home screen, and example question from the electronic patient-reported outcome module. The interface tested was in Greek; the version shown here is in English to facilitate clear communication of the app’s design and functionality.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Participant journey in the usability study.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.. Step sequence in a single think-aloud session.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.. Feature satisfaction. ePRO: electronic patient-reported outcome.
Figure 5.
Figure 5.. Task difficulty.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. de Moraes Hungria VT, Chiattone C, Pavlovsky M, et al. Epidemiology of hematologic malignancies in real-world settings: findings from the hemato-oncology latin america observational registry study. J Glob Oncol. 2019 Nov;5(5):1–19. doi: 10.1200/JGO.19.00025. doi. Medline. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Scarfò L, Karamanidou C, Doubek M, et al. MyPal ADULT study protocol: a randomised clinical trial of the MyPal ePRO-based early palliative care system in ADULT patients with haematological malignancies. BMJ Open. 2021 Nov 2;11(11):e050256. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2021-050256. doi. Medline. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. What is palliative care? Get Palliative Care. [17-08-2022]. https://getpalliativecare.org/whatis/ URL. Accessed.
    1. Consolo L, Castellini G, Cilluffo S, Basile I, Lusignani M. Electronic patient-reported outcomes (e-PROMs) in palliative cancer care: a scoping review. J Patient Rep Outcomes. 2022 Sep 23;6(1):102. doi: 10.1186/s41687-022-00509-z. doi. Medline. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Kiderlen TR, Schnack A, de Wit M. Essential barriers and considerations for the implementation of electronic patient-reported outcome (ePRO) measures in oncological practice: contextualizing the results of a feasibility study with existing literature. J Public Health (Berl) 2023 Dec;31(12):2071–2088. doi: 10.1007/s10389-022-01767-3. doi. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources