Recently a new buzzword has slowly but surely emerged, namely the Internet of Things (IoT). The importance of IoT is identified worldwide both by organisations and governments and the scientific community with an incremental number of publications during the last few years. IoT in Health is one of the main pillars of this evolution, but limited research has been performed on future visions and trends. Thus, in this study we investigate the longitudinal trends of Internet of Things in Health through bibliometrics and use of text mining. Seven hundred seventy eight (778) articles were retrieved form The Web of Science database from 1998 to 2016. The publications are grouped into thirty (30) clusters based on abstract text analysis resulting into some eight (8) trends of IoT in Health. Research in this field is obviously obtaining a worldwide character with specific trends, which are worth delineating to be in favour of some areas.
Background Mobile apps have a great potential to support patients in healthcare, and to encourage healthy behavioral changes such as smoking cessation. Nevertheless, the user rejection levels are still high. A set of factors that has impact on the app effectiveness is related to the quality of those features that lead to positive user experiences when using the app. This work aims to evaluate the user experience, and more specifically the usability and the user satisfaction with a mobile application for smoking cessation. This will also provide a basis for future improvements. Methods We provided a smoking cessation mobile Android app to two different user cohorts, the smokers as valid users and the experts, for three weeks. The app featured usual functionalities to help quit smoking, including an achieved benefits section, mini-games to distract during cravings, and supportive motivational messages. We collected information about user experience, through game playability and message satisfaction questionnaires, and the experts' opinions. We also considered usage of app sections, the duration of the mini-game sessions, and the user ratings for motivational messages. Results We included 45 valid users and 25 experts in this study. The questionnaire indicated 80% satisfaction rate for the motivational messages. According to game questionnaires, over 69% of the participants agreed that the games have good usability features, however, for questions related to mobility and gameplay heuristics, agreements were below 67%. The most accessed app sections were achieved benefits and the one with motivational messages. The experts described issues that could help to improve the application. Conclusions The combination of questionnaires with expert reports allowed to identify several problems and possible corrections. Our study showed that motivational messages have a good satisfaction rate, although it is necessary to consider technical features of some mobile devices that may hinder message reception. Games have good usability and it's expected that the addition of difficulty levels and a better accessibility to the game menu could make them more attractive and increase its usage. Future development of mHealth apps based on gamification and motivational messages need to consider these factors for better user satisfaction and usability. ; European Union's Horizon 2020 No 681120
The Framework (FW) summarizes the experiences and vision of the WHAAM project partners, providing the basis for the development of the WHAAM app and online services. There are many approaches to the treatment of ADHD, with excellent resources available. This FW is a working tool based on partners' experiences, inspiring subsequent project activities. It is divided into three parts: part A explores general issues related to ADHD, focusing on key life contexts such as school, family, and social relationships. Each context is explored in terms of assessment, intervention and support. Part B delves into the relationship between ICT use and ADHD treatment. Finally, Part C briefly explains the main features of the WHAAM app, including functionality and interfaces. The WHAAM project considers the app and online service accessible via PC and mobile devices as a significant advancement in monitoring process management.
The global population is aging in an unprecedented manner and the challenges for improving the lives of older adults are currently both a strong priority in the political and healthcare arena. In this sense, preventive measures and telemedicine have the potential to play an important role in improving the number of healthy years older adults may experience and virtual coaching is a promising research area to support this process. This paper presents COLAEVA, an interactive web application for older adult population clustering and evolution analysis. Its objective is to support caregivers in the design, validation and refinement of coaching plans adapted to specific population groups. COLAEVA enables coaching caregivers to interactively group similar older adults based on preliminary assessment data, using AI features, and to evaluate the influence of coaching plans once the final assessment is carried out for a baseline comparison. To evaluate COLAEVA, a usability test was carried out with 9 test participants obtaining an average SUS score of 71.1. Moreover, COLAEVA is available online to use and explore.
