Applications of Medical Digital Technologies for Noncommunicable Diseases for Follow-Up during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Eman Sobhy Elsaid Hussein; Abdullah Mohammed Al-Shenqiti; Reda Mohamed El-Sayed Ramadan

doi:10.3390/ijerph191912682

Applications of Medical Digital Technologies for Noncommunicable Diseases for Follow-Up during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Oct 4;19(19):12682. doi: 10.3390/ijerph191912682.

Authors

Eman Sobhy Elsaid Hussein^{1

2}, Abdullah Mohammed Al-Shenqiti^{3

4}, Reda Mohamed El-Sayed Ramadan^{2

5}

Affiliations

¹ Nursing Department, College of Applied Medical Sciences-Yanbu, Taibah University, Medina 42353, Saudi Arabia.
² Medical Surgical Nursing Department, Faculty of Nursing, Ain Shams University, Cairo 11566, Egypt.
³ Centre for Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK.
⁴ Faculty of Medical Rehabilitation Sciences, Taibah University, Medina 42353, Saudi Arabia.
⁵ Medical Surgical Nursing, College of Applied Medical Sciences, Shaqra University, Shaqra 15518, Saudi Arabia.

Abstract

Background: Noncommunicable chronic diseases (NCDs) are multifaceted, and the health implications of the COVID-19 pandemic are far-reaching, especially for NCDs. Physical distancing and quarantine can lead to the poor management of NCDs because the visual tracking of them has been replaced with medical digital technology, that is, smartphone apps. This study aimed to explore medical digital technology applications for NCDs for follow-up during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: The participants in this study were 400 adult patients with NCDs; they were selected by systematic random sampling. A descriptive cross-sectional design was used. The study was conducted in the outpatient department of Yanbu General Hospital and primary-care health centers in Yanbu Al-Baher, Al-Madinah Al-Munawwarah, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The tools used in this study were a structured questionnaire to collect the sociodemographic characteristics of the patients and their health history, an NCD questionnaire to assess follow-up of the patients during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a medical digital technologies questionnaire to explore the medical digital technology applications.

Results: The mean age of the patients was 47.32 ± 14.362 years, and 62.8% of them were female and 372 were male. Of the patients, 69.2% and 57.5% had been diagnosed with diabetes mellitus and hypertension, respectively; 52.4% were followed up monthly, and 29.75% used medical digital technology applications such as Tabeby Online to monitor their health. Furthermore, 71.75% and 75.5% of the patients used the Sehhaty and Tawakkalna medical digital applications, respectively. Overall, 38.7% of the patients were satisfied with using medical digital technology applications used for follow-up during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Conclusions: The study concluded that the services that use networks, smartphones, and medical digital technology applications on the Saudi Ministry of Health website and mobile applications to improve the quality of the health-care system, and that provide health services for noncommunicable or communicable diseases, are not effective. This is because the patients lack awareness of these services, with most of the chronic patients being elderly with lower levels of education and computer literacy.

Keywords: COVID-19; follow-up; medical digital technologies; noncommunicable diseases.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adult
Aged
COVID-19* / epidemiology
Cross-Sectional Studies
Digital Technology
Female
Follow-Up Studies
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Noncommunicable Diseases* / epidemiology
Noncommunicable Diseases* / therapy
Pandemics

Grants and funding

The data collection, analysis, editing, and publication of the current study was funded by the Deputyship for Research and Innovation, Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia, Taibah University.