JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Myocardial infarction (MI) is a debilitating condition and a leading cause of morbidity and mortality around the globe. Digital health is a promising approach to delivering secondary prevention to support patients with a history of MI and reduce risk factors that can lead to a future event. However, its potential can only be fulfilled when technology meets the needs of the end-users who will be interacting with this secondary prevention.

Objective:

We aimed to gauge the opinions of patients with a history of MI and health professionals concerning the functions, features, and characteristics of a digital health solution to support post-MI care.

Methods:

Our approach aligned with gold-standard participatory co-design procedures enabling progressive refinement of feedback via exploratory, confirmatory, and prototype-assisted feedback from participants. Patients with a history of MI and health professionals from Australia attended focus groups over a videoconference system. We engaged with 38 participants across three rounds of focus groups using an iterative co-design approach. Round 1 included eight participants (four patients and four health professionals); round 2 included 24 participants (11 patients and 13 health professionals); round 3 included 22 participants (14 patients and eight health professionals).

Results:

Participants highlighted the potential for digital health to address the unmet needs of post-MI care. Both patients with a history of MI and health professionals agreed that mental health is a key concern in post-MI care that requires further support. Both groups agreed that family members should be utilised in post-discharge care and require their own support. Participants agreed that incorporating simple games with a points system can increase long-term engagement. However, patients with a history of MI emphasised a lack of support from their healthcare team, family, and community more strongly than health professionals. They also expressed some openness to using artificial intelligence, while health professionals expressed users should not be aware of artificial intelligence use.

Conclusions:

These results can provide valuable insights towards the development of digital health secondary preventions aimed at supporting patients with a history of MI. Future research can implement a pilot study in the MI population to trial these recommendations in a real-world setting.