Acceptability of using mobile Health (mHealth) as an intervention tool for people with drug use disorders in Tanga, Tanzania

Castory Munishi; Harrieth P Ndumwa; Josephine E Massawe; Belinda J Njiro; Jackline Ngowi; Sanita Suhartono; Anja Busse; Giovanna Campello; Giovanna Garofalo; Pietro Cipolla; Cassian Nyandindi; Omary Ubuguyu; Bruno Sunguya

doi:10.1371/journal.pdig.0000257

Acceptability of using mobile Health (mHealth) as an intervention tool for people with drug use disorders in Tanga, Tanzania

PLOS Digit Health. 2023 Sep 27;2(9):e0000257. doi: 10.1371/journal.pdig.0000257. eCollection 2023 Sep.

Affiliations

¹ Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, P.O Box 65001, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
² Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation Section, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Vienna, Austria.
³ Association Casa Famiglia Rosetta, Italy.
⁴ Drug Control and Enforcement Authority, P.O. Box 80327, Tanzania.
⁵ Ministry of Health, Dodoma, Tanzania.

Abstract

Evidence on the additional benefit in treatment and recovery process among PWDUD using digital health interventions is lacking. This study aimed to describe the acceptability of using a digital intervention to increase information access for PWDUD in Tanga region, Tanzania. This study was conducted among 465 participants in Tanga, a coastal region on the Northeast of Tanzania has the second highest number of PWDUD in Tanzania. This cross-sectional descriptive study used both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The majority of the PWDUD 67.6% do not own mobile phones. Out of the 156 participants with mobile phones, only 6.4% owned a smartphone. Most of the participants, 83.6%, reported living with someone who owns a mobile phone. Importantly, a significant number of participants, 98.5% from both areas showed readiness to use mobile phones to access information about the harmful use of substance and substance use disorder treatment options. Participants described how mobile phones can be useful to them in accessing information related to treatment and access to treatment options. The findings of this study helped to inform the target audience for the developed Huru App that should not be only PWDUD but the community at large.

Copyright: © 2023 Munishi et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Grants and funding

This study was part of a grant funded project by the United States Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs US/INL through the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and its implementing partner, the Association Casa Famiglia Rosetta (ACFR) during an Information, Education, Communication (IEC) campaign named “Awareness in a Caring Community”.The project was ”Improving the Capacity of the System of Drug Use Disorders Treatment Services to Provide Ethical, Evidence-Based and Humane Treatment to Persons with Drug Use Disorders in Tanga, Tanzania” conducted in Tanga Region, Tanzania in 2019-2022 with reference number UNODC/PCA no.37/ACFR/2019.The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The funders did not influence the findings of the study.