Skip to main content
Log in

Transforming usage data into a sustainable mobile health solution

Electronic Markets Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Mobile health systems typically target patients with widely varying backgrounds, expertise, and needs. These systems must therefore be able to adapt easily to suit the preferences and needs of individual users in the identified patient community. This paper explains how usage logs in a mobile health system can be analyzed to understand how different patients use the system over a period of time. It defines a system usage model built on key interaction events which are captured and then analyzed to obtain patterns of patient behaviour. Based on the patterns of usage obtained from a live mobile health system, the paper shows how the usage model can be used by the mobile health system to drive its day-to-day interactions with the patient. This type of adaptation can significantly influence the sustainability and diffusion of a mobile health initiative into the target patient market.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8

References

  • Brusilovsky, P. (1996). Methods and techniques of adaptive hypermedia. User Modeling and User-Adapted Interaction, 6(2–3), 87–129.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Germanakos, P., Mourlas, C., & Samaras, G. (2005). A mobile agent approach for ubiquitous and personalized eHealth information systems. In Proc. Workshop on Personalization for e-Health of the 10th International Conference on User Modeling (UM’05), Edinburgh, Scotland, July 29, 2005, pp. 67–70.

  • Kobsa, A. (1993). User modelling: Recent work, prospects and hazards. In M. Schneider-Hufschmidt, T. Kuhme, & U. Malinowski (Eds.), Adaptive user interfaces: Principles and practice (pp. 111–128). New York: Elsevier Science Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Langley, P. (1999). User modelling in adaptive interfaces. In Proc. of the 7th International Conference on User Modelling, Banff, Canada, June 20–24, pp. 357–370.

  • Mohan, P. & Sultan, S. (2009). MediNet: A Mobile Healthcare Management System for the Caribbean Region. In Proc. of 6th Annual International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Systems: Computing, Networking and Services, Toronto, Canada, July 13–16, pp. 1–2.

  • Mohan, P., Marin, D., Sultan, S., & Deen, A. (2008). MediNet: Personalizing the Self-Care Process for Patients with Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease Using Mobile Telephony. In Proc. of the 30th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, Vancouver, Canada, August 20–24, pp. 755–758

  • Oppermann, R. (1994). Adaptive user support: Ergonomic design of manually and automatically adaptable software. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sultan, S. & Mohan, P. (2009). How to Interact: Evaluating the Interface between Mobile Healthcare Systems and the Monitoring of Blood Sugar and Blood Pressure. In Proc. Workshop on Ubiquitous Mobile Healthcare Applications, Toronto, Canada, July 13–16, pp 1–6.

  • Sultan, S., Mohan, P., & Sultan, N. (2009). Managing Change: Experiences from a New e-Health Initiative for Patients with Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease. In Proc. of 1st IEEE International WoWMoM Workshop on Interdisciplinary Research on E-Health Services and Systems, Kos, Greece, June 15–19, pp. 1–6.

  • Tavasoli, A., & Archer, N. (2009). A proposed intelligent policy-based interface for a mobile eHealth environment. In G. Babin, P. Krofp, and M. Weiss (Eds.), Proc. 4th International MCETECH Conference (MCETECH’09), Ottawa, Canada, May 4–9, 2009, pp. 246–251.

  • Ting, S., & Scisco, P. (2006). The CCL handbook of coaching: A guide for the leader coach. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vasilyeva, E., Pechenizkiy, M., & Puuronen, S. (2005). Towards the framework of adaptive user interfaces for eHealth. In Proc. 18th IEEE International Symposium on Computer-Based Medical Systems (CBMS’05), Dublin, Ireland, June 23–24, 2005, pp. 139–144.

  • Vital Wave Consulting. (2009). mHealth for development: The opportunity of mobile technology for healthcare in the developing world. Washington, D.C., and Berkshire: UN Foundation-Vodafone Foundation Partnership.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weld, D. S., et al. (2003). Automatically personalizing user interfaces. In Proc. 18th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI’03), Acapulco, Mexico, August 9–15, 2003, pp. 1613–1619.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Salys Sultan.

Additional information

Responsible editor: Doug Vogel

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Sultan, S., Mohan, P. Transforming usage data into a sustainable mobile health solution. Electron Markets 23, 63–72 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12525-012-0090-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12525-012-0090-6

Keywords

JEL classification

Navigation