Development of mHealth applications for pre-eclampsia triage

IEEE J Biomed Health Inform. 2014 Nov;18(6):1857-64. doi: 10.1109/JBHI.2014.2301156.

Abstract

The development of mobile applications for the diagnosis and management of pregnant women with pre-eclampsia is described. These applications are designed for use by community-based health care providers (c-HCPs) in health facilities and during home visits to collect symptoms and perform clinical measurements (including pulse oximeter readings). The clinical data collected in women with pre-eclampsia are used as the inputs to a predictive model providing a risk score for the development of adverse outcomes. Based on this risk, the applications provide recommendations on treatment, referral, and reassessment. c-HCPs can access patient records across multiple visits, using multiple devices that are synchronized using a secure Research Electronic Data Capture server. A unique feature of these applications is the ability to measure oxygen saturation with a pulse oximeter connected to a smartphone (Phone Oximeter). The mobile health application development process, including challenges encountered and solutions are described.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Blood Pressure
  • Cell Phone
  • Decision Support Systems, Clinical
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Medical Informatics Applications*
  • Oximetry
  • Pre-Eclampsia / diagnosis*
  • Pre-Eclampsia / therapy
  • Pregnancy
  • Risk Assessment / methods*
  • Telemedicine / methods*
  • User-Computer Interface