JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

With increasing life expectancy and aging populations, the global prevalence of chronic diseases and the long-term care required for these comorbidities is expanding. This has led to an ever-growing need for caregiving. Previous literature has found that caregivers face problems of isolation and loneliness. However, many health organisations are mainly focus efforts on in-person community groups that require participants to meet physically. This is not always convenient or accessible for caregivers, who are often juggling caring for their care recipient, with family and work responsibilities.

Objective:

With medical advancements such as the proliferation of mobile phones and internet technology, caregivers may have opportunities to have easier access to resources and support. Technological innovations could help empower the caregiving community to seek assistance for improving their quality of life at their convenience. A community network application called Caregivers’ Circle was conceptualized in response to the needs of caregivers on a day-to-day caregiving journey. This paper traces the pre-development inquiry and technical details of the app to maintain a clear understanding of its implementation along with a usability study to gauge user opinion of the application within Singapore.

Methods:

To identify specific needs of caregivers and gaps in the currently available online community networks, a pre-development survey was first conducted. Questions consisted of demographics, health related issues of the care recipient, mental and physical health related issues of the caregiver, digital media use, information seeking, and support. 103 caregivers completed the pre-app development survey. Qualitative enquiries were also conducted with caregivers within Singapore to identify issues related to caregiving, support provided and what caregivers would want from a caregiving mobile application.

Results:

From the feedback garnered from the caregivers, the developers were able to identify several caregiver’s needs and gaps within the current support networks. This feedback was integrated into the mobile application called “Caregivers’ Circle” upon development. Features include a public forum for community discussions, a marketplace to buy and sell items, care groups to hold private discussions with friends or other users in the application, and a friend feature to search and add new caregiving friends.

Conclusions:

In general, users liked the app and were confident that it can help them to better their life daily. Caregivers’ Circle is unique in its integrated approach. By integrating many features that caregivers need on daily basis into an easy app can save their time as well as help them to navigate their life smoothly.