The development of My Care Hub Mobile-Phone App to Support Self-Management in Australians with Type 1 or Type 2 Diabetes

Sci Rep. 2020 Jan 8;10(1):7. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-56411-0.

Abstract

Non-adherence to self-management poses a serious risk to diabetes complications. Digital behavioural change interventions have the potential to provide education and motivate users to regularly engage with self-management of diabetes. This paper describes the development of My Care Hub mobile phone application (app) aimed at supporting self-management in people with type 1 or type 2 diabetes. The development of My Care Hub involved a comprehensive process of healthy behavioural change identification, end users' needs, expert consensus, data security and privacy considerations. The app translation was a highly iterative process accompanied by usability testing and design modification. The app development process included: (1) behaviour change strategy selection; (2) users' involvement; (3) expert advisory involvement; (4) data security and privacy considerations; (5) design creation and output translation into a smartphone app and (6) two usability testings of the app prototype version. The app features include self-management activities documentation, analytics, personalized and generalized messages for diabetes self-management as well as carbohydrate components of common foods in Australia. Twelve respondents provided feedback on the usability of the app. Initially, a simplification of the documentation features of the app was identified as a need to improve usability. Overall, results indicated good user satisfaction rate.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Cell Phone / statistics & numerical data*
  • Diabetes Mellitus, Type 1 / therapy*
  • Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 / therapy*
  • Female
  • Health Behavior
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Mobile Applications / standards*
  • Pilot Projects
  • Self Care*
  • Self-Management / methods*
  • Telemedicine / methods*