Accepted for/Published in: JMIR mHealth and uHealth
Date Submitted: Mar 21, 2018
Open Peer Review Period: Mar 21, 2018 - May 16, 2018
Date Accepted: Dec 10, 2018
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
User preferences and persona design for an mHealth intervention to support adherence to cardiovascular disease medication in Singapore.
ABSTRACT
Background:
The use of mHealth has gained popularity globally including for use in variety of health interventions, particularly through SMS. However, there are challenges to the use of mHealth, particularly amongst older users who have a large heterogeneity in usability and accessibility barriers when using technology. In order to better understand and conceptualise the diversity of users and give insight into their particular needs, we turned to persona creation. Personas are user archetypes created through data generated from mixed-methods inquiry with actual target users. Personas are an appropriate yet largely underutilised component of current mHealth research.
Methods:
Leveraging on data from a mixed methods study conducted in Singapore with an ethnically diverse population including Chinese, Malay and Indian participants, we used a proforma to analyse data from the qualitative component (n=20 in-depth interviews) and quantitative component (n=100 interviewer guided surveys). We then identified key characteristics including technology use and preferences as well as adherence factors to synthesize five personas reflective of persons over the age of 40 years old with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) or ASCVD risk factors such as hypertension, in Singapore.
Results:
We present five personas typologized as 1) The Quiet Analog, 2) The Busy Grandparent, 3) The Socializer, 4) The Newly Diagnosed and 5) The Hard-to-Reach. We report on four key characteristics - health care access, medication adherence, mobile phone technology usage (ownership, access and utilization) and interest in mHealth. Finally, we provide insights into how these personas may be used in the design and implementation of an mHealth intervention. Our work demonstrates how mixed methods data can create biopsychosocial personas which can be used to explore and address the diversity in behaviours, preferences and needs in user groups. Conclusion: With wider adoption of mHealth, it is important that we consider user-centered design techniques, and design thinking in order to create meaningful, patient centered interventions for adherence to medications. Future research in this area should include greater exploration of how these five personas can be used to better understand how and when is best to deliver mHealth interventions in Singapore and beyond.
Citation
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Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.