Remote Digital Health Interventions to Support the Physical, Functional, or Psychological Rehabilitation of Adult Patients With Major Traumatic Injuries: Protocol for a Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials

Abstract

Background: The use of digital health (DH) interventions has increased over the past 2 decades, providing patients with alternative remote pathways for receiving health care services. Patients with major trauma frequently require long-term access to health care services to support their mental and physical health and their overall quality of life. DH interventions can help patients stay connected to rehabilitation services, thereby enhancing their health condition and helping them regain their independence, which will enable them to return to the workplace or regain a role in society. There is a need to explore existing evidence on the effectiveness of DH interventions for improving health-related outcomes in patients with major trauma.

Objective: This review aims to identify DH interventions that support the physical, functional, or psychological rehabilitation of patients who have experienced major physical trauma.

Methods: This review targets randomized controlled trials. Studies investigating DH interventions in adult patients with major traumatic physical injuries (end users of the interventions) are considered eligible for inclusion. Digital interventions that are delivered remotely and studies that report the impact of DH interventions on patients' health-related outcomes will be included. The search will be limited to publications since 2000 and peer-reviewed journals. No language restrictions will be applied, and articles not written in English will be translated. The search will be conducted in MEDLINE, Embase, AMED, CINAHL Plus, and PsycInfo. Grey literature and bibliographies of included studies and relevant reviews will also be searched for potentially relevant articles. A minimum of two reviewers will independently screen retrieved references. Data extraction will be conducted by 1 reviewer and independently checked by another reviewer. Quality assessment of the included studies will be conducted using the Cochrane Risk of Bias 2 tool. Any disagreements arising at any stage of the review will be resolved through discussion or by consulting a third reviewer, if required. A meta-analysis will be performed where possible, and a descriptive analysis of the included studies will be reported.

Results: As of January 2025, the systematic review is in the data extraction stage. Seven studies have been identified as eligible for inclusion. The findings are expected to be published in a peer-reviewed journal by December 2025.

Conclusions: The review findings will help identify existing evidence regarding DH interventions used to support the physical, functional, or psychological rehabilitation needs of patients with major trauma. This would help guide practitioners and policy makers to implement effective interventions to better support patient outcomes. The evidence synthesized from this review will also identify existing gaps and direct future research.

Trial registration: PROSPERO CRD42023485748; https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/view/CRD42023485748.

International registered report identifier (irrid): DERR1-10.2196/67675.

Keywords: digital health; mHealth; major injury; major trauma; mobile health app; physical trauma; rehabilitation; telemedicine.