JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Mobile Health (mHealth) solutions can be used to increase patients’ engagement in self-care. Descriptions of the technical solutions behind mHealth smartphone-applications (apps) may guide the development of future apps. Here, we aim to describe the technical background and the visual display of the DiaCert-system developed to support daily walking among patients with type 2 diabetes. The DiaCert-system publishes one application program interface developed for the patient devices (i.e. smartphone-apps running on iOS or Android) and one web-based health care provider component, (i.e. administrative component). An individual care plan is created for each patient in the care giver platform and data on physical activity (steps), blood samples and questionnaires, is shared between patient and care giver in the DiaCert-system. Technical solutions such as this enables us to reach more individuals at a lower cost than traditional health care. An advantage to the DiaCert technical solution is that it is built on simple architecture and therefore is easily scalable. However, as it is a separate solution, it means adding yet another process for health care personnel to integrate in their work, which must be acknowledged. We hope that our technical description and the visual display of the DiaCert-system herein can guide researchers in the design and building of new and effective mHealth solutions.