Doctors' Personal Preference and Adoption of Mobile Apps to Communicate with Patients in China: Qualitative Study.

BACKGROUND: Different kinds of mobile apps are used to promote communications between patients and doctors. Studies have investigated patients' mobile app adoption behavior; however, they offer limited insights into doctors' personal preferences among a variety of choices of mobile apps. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the nuanced adoption behaviors among doctors in China, which has a robust adoption of mobile apps in health care, and to explore the constraints influencing their selection of specific mobile apps. This paper addressed 3 research questions: (1) Which doctors opt to adopt mobile apps to communicate with patients? (2) What types of mobile apps do they choose? (3) To what degree do they exercise personal choice in adopting specific mobile apps? METHODS: We used thematic content analysis of qualitative data gathered from semistructured interviews with 11 doctors in Hangzhou, which has been recognized for its advanced adoption of mobile technology in social services, including health care services. The selection of participants was purposive, encompassing diverse departments and hospitals. RESULTS: In total, 5 themes emerged from the data analysis. First, the interviewees had a variety of options for communicating with patients via mobile apps, with the predominant ones being social networking apps (eg, WeChat) and medical platforms (eg, Haodf). Second, all interviewees used WeChat to facilitate communication with patients, although their willingness to share personal accounts varied (they are more likely to share with trusty intermediaries). Third, fewer than half of the doctors adopted medical platforms, and they were all from tertiary hospitals. Fourth, the preferences for in-person, WeChat, or medical platform communication reflected the interviewees' perceptions of different patient cohorts. Lastly, the selection of a particular kind of mobile app was significantly influenced by the doctors' affiliation with hospitals, driven by their professional obligations to fulfill multiple tasks assigned by the hospitals or the necessity of maintaining social connections with their colleagues. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings contribute to a nuanced understanding of doctors' adoption behavior regarding specific types of mobile apps for patient communication, instead of addressing such adoption behavior of a wide range of mobile apps as equal. Their choices of a particular kind of app were positioned within a social context where health care policies (eg, limited funding for public hospitals, dominance of public health care institutions, and absence of robust referral systems) and traditional culture (eg, trust based on social connections) largely shape their behavioral patterns.

Wired Sex Assemblages Among Men Who Have Sex with Men: Sexualized Drug Use, Hookup Apps, and HIV Service Provision.

Sexualized drug use is a form of sexual practice that resists risk-based discourses (otherwise referred to as "radical sex practices") and is reportedly common among gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men (GBMSM). With the growth of online technologies, the use of hookup apps has also increased. We refer to men's use of drugs, apps, and sex form as "wired sex" that forms what post-structuralist theorists Deleuze and Guattari described as an assemblage. Perspectives of the health and social service providers who work directly with GBMSM has not been explored. This research project involved a critical discourse analysis of 13 semi-structured interviews with service providers in Canada to understand their perspectives and interactions with wired sex assemblages. We identified several themes reflecting the social and political effects of wired sex assemblages and discuss the implications of these effects on services provision with GBMSM.

A new method to measure and decrease the online social networking addiction.

INTRODUCTION: The online social networking addiction is a type of technology addiction that can lead to distraction, depression, anxiety, and lower academic performance. In this research, an android mobile application was designed based on the previous literature as well as authors' previous works to measure and decrease social networking addiction level. METHODS: This research is a randomized controlled trial. Participants were the students in Urmia University of Technology. The mobile application was designed and sent to 100 (35 males and 65 females) students randomly as an intervention group and was sent to 100 (38 males and 62 females) students randomly as a control group. In order to evaluate the efficacy of treatment, data were collected before and after 2-week treatment. RESULTS: The results indicated that the designed mobile application can measure the online social networking addiction level with online social networking addiction scale, it can also decrease the online social networking addiction, depression, anxiety level, and the time spent on online social networks, and it can improve the sleep quality and life satisfaction level. DISCUSSION: Therefore, the designed mobile application can be used as an appropriate instrument to measure and decrease the online social networking addiction level of college students.

Assessing Self-Control and Geosocial Networking App Behavior Among an Online Sample of Men Who Have Sex with Men.

Geosocial networking phone applications (GSN apps) used to meet sexual partners have become popular in the men who have sex with men (MSM) communities of the USA since 2009. Previous studies have shown greater incidence of gonorrhea and chlamydia and lower testing frequency for HIV testing among GSN app users when compared to non-users. The present study aims to determine the type, number, and frequency of apps used, as well as the association between dispositional self-control and health-related behaviors. Participants (n = 146) were recruited from Amazon's Mechanical Turk program to respond to a brief GSN app marketing survey. Multivariate regression was used to determine differences in app priorities, length of app use, and number of sexual partners between high self-control and low self-control participants. A majority of the participants reported using Grindr (78 %) followed by Scruff (19 %), Growlr (12 %), and Jack'd (12 %). Most individuals used one app only (58 %), but a significant proportion reported using two apps (28 %) or three or more apps (14 %). Respondents with low self-control were more likely to report a higher number of hours using GSN apps and a higher number of sexual partners, controlling for race/ethnicity, education, employment, and HIV status. Given the popularity of this burgeoning communication medium, these findings have important implications for developing prevention resources for different segments of GSN app users.