JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

People living with multiple chronic conditions (MCC) face substantial challenges in planning and coordinating increasingly complex care. Family caregivers provide important assistance for people with MCC but lack sufficient support. Caregiver apps have the potential to help by enhancing care coordination and planning among patients, caregivers, and clinicians.

Objective:

To assess the evidence on the development and use of caregiver apps that support care coordination, identify key characteristics (i.e., needs, barriers, facilitators) related to care planning and coordination and assess functionalities desired by caregivers.

Methods:

We performed a scoping review using the JBI Scoping Review guidelines and the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews. We searched 6 databases: PubMed, Cochrane, CINAHIL, SCOPUS, Web of Science, and Embase for articles published in English between January 2011 and June 2021 and intersecting two major domains, mHealth apps and caregivers. We conducted ancestry searches of caregiver app reviews and caregiver literature reviews and searched several domain specific journal databases including: JAMIA, JMIR, IJMI, JAMA, and NEJM. Two authors independently screened titles and abstracts, followed by full texts for eligibility, while a third author resolved disagreements.

Results:

We identified 34 articles representing 25 individual studies, with publication dates ranging from 2015 to 2021. Eighteen articles were feasibility/usability/pilot studies (53%), with needs assessment articles representing 38% (n=13). Only 3 articles used quantitative research methods to assess intervention efficacy. Research was predominantly conducted in the U.S. (22 of 34), with additional articles from Australia, Spain, Canada, the U.K., South Korea, and Turkey.

Conclusions:

Overall, information and research on the use of mHealth applications for care planning and coordination, and enhancing links between caregivers, patients, and clinicians, is limited. We identified important functionalities and features enabling caregiver apps to meet care planning and coordination needs and facilitate caregiving activities. To date, no study has focused on measuring an mHealth intervention within the crucial domain of care planning and coordination for people with MCC. Moreover, there is a need to facilitate integration of caregivers’ roles into the electronic health record (EHR), with the result that communication among caregivers, care recipients, and healthcare providers through the EHR remains elusive. The development and implementation of an mHealth app linking caregivers, patients, and clinicians, integrated with the EHR and other crucial resources, to enhance care planning and coordination for people with MCC, remains an unmet goal.