Previously submitted to: Journal of Medical Internet Research (no longer under consideration since Jun 17, 2021)
Date Submitted: May 31, 2021
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Applicability and effectiveness of mobile health services for older adults population with diabetes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
ABSTRACT
Background:
Mobile health services educate patients with diabetes regarding their personal condition, helping them better manage the disease and mitigate complications from diabetes.
Objective:
Because mobile health services use mobile computing devices, such as smartphones, it remains unclear whether such services can meet the needs of older adult patients with diabetes with respect to health information and communication with medical groups. Thus, this study explored how effective and applicable mobile medical services are among older adult patients with diabetes.
Methods:
Adopting a systematic review approach, we searched for peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2010 and 2020. We obtained 523 potentially relevant studies but meta-analyzed the study data of nine of them after applying inclusion and exclusion criteria. Our patients were from three countries and had a mean age of 60 years.
Results:
The combined effects were statistically significant; they were 3-month post-intervention weighted mean difference (WMD) = −0.62 (95% CI: −1.06, −0.17) and 6-month post-intervention WMD = −0.42 (95% CI: −0.61, −0.23).
Conclusions:
Mobile health services are partially effective among older adult patients with diabetes. These services can improve blood sugar levels, depression symptoms, and health conditions. Obstacles remain, such as technical anxiety, but they can be eliminated by including technical guidance and remote supervision services.
Citation
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Copyright
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