mHealth Technology: Towards a New Mobile Application for Caregivers of the Elderly Living with Multiple Chronic Conditions (ELMCC)

mHealth (healthcare using mobile technologies) can be a worthy tool in the care, tracking and management of chronic diseases. It also has the potential to enhance the health and the quality of life for the elderly living with multiple chronic conditions (ELMCC), especially ones who depend on others to help care for them. Critical to being able to achieve this potential, however, an application should both support the needed health management tasks and also support people's motivation to use the tool itself. To identify the desired content and features of such a mobile application for caregivers of the ELMCC, a qualitative research study of caregiving and mHealth support tools was conducted. Four focus group sessions with 27 English speaking caregivers were held in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The data was analyzed with respect to reported functional needs as well as aspects related to motivation or persuasive design. The latter analysis was based on a new synthesis of frameworks of Self-determination theory [1], Fogg's functional role triad [2], and Persuasive system design (PSD) [3,4,5]. Looking at current health tools, we found that software can function as a social actor by providing personal outreach and chat forums and can incorporate persuasive technology through games and virtual rewards, health to-do-lists, and simulations on how to communicate with ELMCC. Participants reported several desired functions including: Calendar, reminders/alerts, charts/graphs, microphone, and display of lab results. No current software appears to address all of the desired aspects predicted by our framework. Findings from the focus groups and our analysis of how software can address their motivational needs should guide the design of better mobile applications for ELMCC caregivers.