Background: Spine disorders are conditions that affect a growing number of individuals, and mobile health (mHealth) applications (apps) offer potential to assist the self-management of these conditions.
Objectives: To perform a systematic review of the availability of mHealth apps for patients with spine disorders at Brazilian online stores and evaluate the apps in terms of engagement, user interface, experience, and quality of the information.
Design: Systematic review.
Method: A search for spine disorders mHealth apps from the Google Play Store and AppStore in Brazil was performed by two independent reviewers on June 2021. Only smartphone apps in Brazilian Portuguese directed at spine disorders that provided information about education, counseling, exercise, or monitoring of patient health were included. The quality of eligible mHealth apps was assessed using the Mobile App Rating Scale (MARS).
Results: Of the 2775 mHealth apps found, 10 were eligible for inclusion. All apps offered exercise programs. Three apps also offered tools to track patient-reported symptoms, nutritional orientation, or educational content in addition to the exercise program. Using MARS, the apps scored poorly in terms of quality, with an overall mean score ±standard deviation of 2.75 ± 0.63 on a scale of 1-5 points. Most apps scored poorly for credibility, user interface, and engagement.
Conclusions: The mHealth apps for spine disorders currently available in Brazil are of poor quality and limited functionality. Effective collaboration between industry and researchers is needed to develop better user-centered mHealth apps that can empower patients with these conditions.
Keywords: Back pain; Low back pain; Neck pain; mHealth.
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