A consumer designed smartphone app for young people with asthma: pilot of engagement and acceptability.

Objective: This pilot aimed to test the engagement, acceptability, and usefulness of a goal-setting smartphone app, Kiss myAsthma, in young people with asthma.Methods: Young people aged 15-24 years old were invited to trial a smartphone app for asthma management. A mixed-methods approach combined quantitative analysis of self-report questionnaires and app usage log data with qualitative thematic analysis of open-ended questions at baseline and six weeks after downloading the app. App log data (pages visited, frequency of use and content of participants interaction, e.g.goals set, symptoms recorded) were analyzed.Results: Nine of 12 participants completed both baseline and six-week questionnaires. Participants reported high satisfaction with app content and usability (median score 5 out of 6 [range 4-6]) and rated the app highly on "feeling confident in my ability to manage my asthma." At six weeks there was a clinically significant change in asthma quality of life (e.g. Emotional Function domain score baseline: 4.7 [2.7-6.3], follow-up: 5.7 [4.7-6.7]; p = 0.043). Participants logged information about asthma severity, flare-ups and mood and tracked their symptoms with the app's History functionality. Five participants (42%) nominated goals and strategies and 3 participants (25%) entered data in the Inspiration section, a tool to support intrinsic motivation to manage asthma. Qualitative data aligned with quantitative results.Conclusions: This six-week pilot of the Kiss myAsthma app showed its potential to support self-management, quality of life and health behavior change in young people with asthma.

Toward Impactful Collaborations on Computing and Mental Health.

We describe an initiative to bring mental health researchers, computer scientists, human-computer interaction researchers, and other communities together to address the challenges of the global mental ill health epidemic. Two face-to-face events and one special issue of the Journal of Medical Internet Research were organized. The works presented in these events and publication reflect key state-of-the-art research in this interdisciplinary collaboration. We summarize the special issue articles and contextualize them to present a picture of the most recent research. In addition, we describe a series of collaborative activities held during the second symposium and where the community identified 5 challenges and their possible solutions.

Young People's Preferences for an Asthma Self-Management App Highlight Psychological Needs: A Participatory Study.

BACKGROUND: Although the prevalence of mental illness among young people with asthma is known to be twice the rate of the wider population, none of the asthma apps reported have acknowledged or attempted to include psychological support features. This is perhaps because user involvement in the development of asthma apps has been scarce. User involvement, facilitated by participatory design methods, can begin to address these issues while contributing insights to our understanding of the psychological experience associated with asthma and how technology might improve quality of life. OBJECTIVE: The goal of this participatory user research study was to explore the experience, needs, and ideas of young people with asthma while allowing them to define requirements for an asthma app that would be engaging and effective at improving their well-being. METHODS: Young people aged 15-24 years with doctor-diagnosed asthma were invited to participate in a participatory workshop and to complete a workbook designed to elicit their thoughts and ideas about living with asthma, technology use, and the design of an app. Participants generated a number of artifacts (including collages, concept maps, and paper prototypes) designed to reify their ideas, tacit knowledge, and experience. RESULTS: A total of 20 participants (mean age 17.8 years; 60%, 12/20 female) representing a range from inadequately to well-controlled asthma completed a workbook and 13 of these also took part in a workshop (four workshops were held in total), resulting in 102 participant-generated artifacts. Theoretical thematic analysis resulted in a set of personal needs, feature ideas, and app characteristics considered relevant by young people for an asthma support app. The data revealed that psychological factors such as anxiety, and impediments to autonomy, competence, and relatedness (as consistent with self-determination theory [SDT]), were considered major influences on quality of life by young people with asthma. Furthermore, the incorporation of features pertaining to psychological experience was particularly valued by participants. CONCLUSIONS: In addition to practical features for asthma management, an app for young people with asthma should include support for the mental health factors associated with lived experience (ie, anxiety, lack of autonomy, and social disconnectedness). We show how support for these factors can be translated into design features of an app for asthma. In addition to informing the development of asthma-support technologies for young people, these findings could have implications for technologies designed to support people with chronic illness more generally.