TControl: A mobile app to follow up tobacco-quitting patients.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Tobacco smoking is a major risk factor for a wide range of respiratory and circulatory diseases in active and passive smokers. Well-designed campaigns are raising awareness to the problem and an increasing number of smokers seeks medical assistance to quit their habit. In this context, there is the need to develop mHealth Apps that assist and manage large smoke quitting programs in efficient and economic ways. OBJECTIVES: Our main objective is to develop an efficient and free mHealth app that facilitates the management of, and assistance to, people who want to quit smoking. As secondary objectives, our research also aims at estimating the economic effect of deploying that App in the public health system. METHODS: Using JAVA and XML we develop and deploy a new free mHealth App for Android, called TControl (Tobacco-quitting Control). We deploy the App at the Tobacco Unit of the Santa Maria Hospital in Lleida and determine its stability by following the crashes of the App. We also use a survey to test usability of the app and differences in aptitude for using the App in a sample of 31 patients. Finally, we use mathematical models to estimate the economic effect of deploying TControl in the Catalan public health system. RESULTS: TControl keeps track of the smoke-quitting users, tracking their status, interpreting it, and offering advice and psychological support messages. The App also provides a bidirectional communication channel between patients and clinicians via mobile text messages. Additionally, registered patients have the option to interchange experiences with each other by chat. The App was found to be stable and to have high performances during startup and message sending. Our results suggest that age and gender have no statistically significant effect on patient aptitude for using TControl. Finally, we estimate that TControl could reduce costs for the Catalan public health system (CPHS) by up to € 400M in 10 years. CONCLUSIONS: TControl is a stable and well behaved App, typically operating near optimal performance. It can be used independent of age and gender, and its wide implementation could decrease costs for the public health system.

BPcontrol. A Mobile App to Monitor Hypertensive Patients.

BACKGROUND: Hypertension or high blood pressure is on the rise. Not only does it affect the elderly but is also increasingly spreading to younger sectors of the population. Treating this condition involves exhaustive monitoring of patients. The current mobile health services can be improved to perform this task more effectively. OBJECTIVE: To develop a useful, user-friendly, robust and efficient app, to monitor hypertensive patients and adapted to the particular requirements of hypertension. METHODS: This work presents BPcontrol, an Android and iOS app that allows hypertensive patients to communicate with their health-care centers, thus facilitating monitoring and diagnosis. Usability, robustness and efficiency factors for BPcontrol were evaluated for different devices and operating systems (Android, iOS and system-aware). Furthermore, its features were compared with other similar apps in the literature. RESULTS: BPcontrol is robust and user-friendly. The respective start-up efficiency of the Android and iOS versions of BPcontrol were 2.4 and 8.8 times faster than a system-aware app. Similar values were obtained for the communication efficiency (7.25 and 11.75 times faster for the Android and iOS respectively). When comparing plotting performance, BPcontrol was on average 2.25 times faster in the Android case. Most of the apps in the literature have no communication with a server, thus making it impossible to compare their performance with BPcontrol. CONCLUSIONS: Its optimal design and the good behavior of its facilities make BPcontrol a very promising mobile app for monitoring hypertensive patients.

Seguimiento y control de pacientes fumadores en proceso de deshabituación mediante SMS. Una experiencia en e-salud / No disponible

El consumo de tabaco continúa siendo una importante causa de morbilidad y mortalidad. El proceso terapéutico para abandonar el tabaco consiste en la desintoxicación física de la nicotina y en el mantenimiento de la abstinencia de su consumo. Nuestro estudio se sitúa en este contexto, ofreciendo una estrategia de apoyo por SMS y monitorizando al paciente a lo largo del tratamiento. Material y método. Este estudio longitudinal compara dos grupos de pacientes: uno con apoyo a través de SMS y otro, de control, que no disfruta de dicho apoyo. Los pacientes recibieron aleatoriamente mensajes de apoyo y refuerzo positivo, así como preguntas sobre su estado. El resto de la terapia es igual para ambos grupos. Resultados. El grupo que recibía apoyo por SMS presentó unas tasas de abstinencia mejores que el otro (57,1% frente a 42,9%). Los mismos participantes valoran positivamente la metodología y admiten que les ahorra tiempo y viajes. Conclusión. El uso de las TIC para monitorizar y reforzar el proceso de desintoxicación del consumo de tabaco parece ser efectivo y bien acogido por los pacientes

Tobacco consumption continues to be an important cause of morbidity and mortality. The therapeutic process of giving up smoking consists of the physical detoxification of nicotine as well as maintaining abstinence from its consumption. Our study lies in this context, offering a strategy by means of SMS support and monitoring patients throughout their treatment. Material and method. This longitudinal study compares two groups of patients, one with support via SMS and a control group without this support. Patients randomly received support messages and positive reinforcement as well as questions about their status. The rest of the therapy is equal in both groups. Results. The abstinence rates obtained among the group with SMS support were better than those of the other group (57.1% as opposed to 42.9%). They themselves value the methodology successfully, recognizing that it saves time and travel. Conclusion. The use of ICT in the monitoring and support of the detoxification process of tobacco consumption appears to be effective and well accepted by patients

S-PC: an e-treatment application for management of smoke-quitting patients.

The main objective of this paper is to present a new program that facilitates the management of people who want to quit smoking, implemented through an e-treatment software called S-PC (Smoker Patient Control). S-PC is a web-based application that manages groups of patients, provides a bidirectional communication through mobile text messages and e-mails between patients and clinicians and offers advice and control to keep track of the patients and their status. A total of 229 patients were enrolled in the study, randomly divided into two groups, although some variables were tested to ensure that there were no significant differences between the groups that could have an impact on the outcome of the treatment. There were no significant differences between the two groups regarding the ratio/number of males/females, tobacco dependence, co-oximetry, average cigarette consumption, current age and age when smoking started. The first group was made up of 104 patients (45.4% of the total) and followed a treatment that incorporated the S-PC tool, while the second one had 125 patients without the S-PC tool. S-PC was evaluated for its effectiveness at assisting the patients to give up smoking, and its effect on clinician time management. 74% of the S-PC group completed the treatment without relapses and remained abstinent three months after the completion of the treatment, understanding abstinence as being continuous (with no relapses allowed and co-oximetry below 1 ppm) from the day of stopping. In contrast only 45.6% of the No S-PC group completed the treatment without relapses and remained abstinent three months after completion of the treatment. The rate of admittance to the program has doubled in one year and patients went from having to wait for 3 months to be immediately admitted into the program. This therapeutic e-health program aims at maximizing the number of patients that a professional can effectively help to quit smoking. In addition, the system also detects patients who are not progressing appropriately, allowing the professional to improve their treatment parameters dynamically.