Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Mental Health
Date Submitted: May 9, 2023
Date Accepted: Sep 8, 2023
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited.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.
Patient Experience of Digitalized Follow-up of Antidepressant Treatment in Psychiatric Outpatient Care: a Qualitative Analysis
ABSTRACT
Background:
Nonadherence to pharmaceutical antidepressant treatment is common among patients with depression. Digitalized follow-up (ie, self-monitoring systems through mobile apps) has been suggested as an effective adjunct to conventional antidepressant treatment to increase medical adherence, improve symptoms of depression, and reduce healthcare resource utilization.
Objective:
The aim of this study was to determine patient experience of digitalized follow-up using a mobile app as an adjunct to treatment concurrent with new prescription or change of antidepressant, or dose increase.
Methods:
This was a qualitative, descriptive study. Patients at 2 psychiatric outpatient clinics were recruited at the time of changing antidepressant medication. After using a mobile app (either a commercial app or a public app) for 4-6 weeks, individual semistructured interviews were conducted. Recorded data was transcribed and then analyzed by content analysis.
Results:
Thirteen participants completed the study. Mean age was 35 years, 8 were female, and all reported high digital literacy. Overall, the emerged themes indicated that the participants experienced the digital app as a valuable adjunct to antidepressant treatment but with potential for improvement. Both user adherence and medical adherence were positively affected by a daily reminder and the app's ease of use. User adherence was negatively affected by the severity of depression. The positive experience of visually presented data as graphs was a key finding, which was beneficial for self-awareness, the patient-physician relationship, and user adherence. Finally, the participants had mixed reactions to the app's content and requested a tailored content.
Conclusions:
Participants identified several factors addressing both medical adherence and user adherence to a digital app when using it for digitalized follow-up concurrent with the critical time related to changes in antidepressant medication. The findings highlight the need for rigorous evidence-based empirical studies to generate sustainable research results.
Citation
