Background

The increasing ageing population puts demands on society and particularly on health care system to promote a health related qualityof life. Thus, it is necessary to develop strategies that promote self-care among older adults that enable them to live in their own homes as long as possible and to make them feel safe and involved in their care. In order to encourage their participationin their care, new innovative solutions are needed. The market of information-and communication technology (ICT)-based platforms directed to the health care arena has exploded during recent years. Despite the large range of products few are developed withinteractive components. In collaboration within a multicenter research group and a Swedish health care company (Health Navigator) an ICT-platform is developed for use in a mobile phone or tablet that includes an interactive mobile application for reporting problems and concerns. This platform is unique through the real-time communication enabling rapid management of early-detected problems.

Aim

The aim with the project is to evaluate an ICT-platform by older adults living in own homes with assistance from home care nurses in a community in Sweden.

Method

The study is prospective and has a mixed methods approach advocated for the evaluation of new technologies within healthcare. This includes a quantitative approach to evaluate effects, qualitative methods such as interviews and focus group discussions to evaluate how patients and health care professionals perceive the intervention. The design is underpinned by the Medical Research Council’s complex intervention evaluation framework. Thirty older adults >65 years or above, living in their own homes, with assistance from home care nurses have through an application in a tablet reported health status twice a week and when needed during three months. They have continuous access to evidence based self-care advice directly related to their reported problems and concerns. The risk assessment model sends alarms to involved nurses via text messaging (SMS). This initiates an interaction between the nurse and the older adult who is contacted by telephone to discuss the reported problems. Furthermore, the nurses in charge can also log into a web-interface and view the reports of the participants. Individually interviews with the older adults and focus groups interviews with nurses are conducted after the study period. Questionnaires are given to the older adults before intervention, after the study ́s completed and after six months with primarily main outcomes as self-care, health literacy and well-being. A control group with older adults 65 years and above is used as a comparison.

Results

Preliminary results will be presented with focus on feasibility, acceptability and benefit of the ICT-platform from the perspective of older adults and home care nurses. Additional logged data on the frequency of symptom reports, alerts, and page views will also be presented.

Summary

An interactive ICT-platform is developed and used by older adults to report problems and concerns which enabling rapid management of early-detected problems. This study aims to evaluate the ICT-platform by thirty older adults living in own home with assistance from home care nurses.