Abstract: PO1121
Mobile Health (mHealth) Readiness Among Dialysis Patients
Session Information
- Hemodialysis and Frequent Dialysis - 2
October 22, 2020 | Location: On-Demand
Abstract Time: 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Category: Dialysis
- 701 Dialysis: Hemodialysis and Frequent Dialysis
Authors
- Hussein, Wael F., Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Bennett, Paul N., Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Pace, Sloane, Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Chen, Shijie, Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Legg, Veronica, Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Sun, Sumi J., Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Abra, Graham E., Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
- Schiller, Brigitte, Satellite Healthcare, San Jose, California, United States
Background
Mobile health (mHealth) is the healthcare use of mobile devices such as mobile phones. mHealth has demonstrated improvement in patient-reported outcome measures, resource efficiencies and cost savings. The aim of this study was to examine the status and correlates of mHealth readiness among individuals on dialysis.
Methods
Cross-sectional 30-item questionnaire, adapted from Bonner’s mHealth instrument guided by Khatun’s mHealth readiness model, was distributed to people on dialysis from 13 in-center hemodialysis (HD) facilities and 14 home dialysis centers. Proficiency was determined by reported use of applications of increasing level of complexity. We used regression analysis to investigate the relationship between demographic and social factors with proficiency.
Results
949 patients (632 HD and 317 home dialysis) completed the survey (56% response rate), 38% were female. 73% of respondents reported using the internet: 90% of them requiring no assistance. 81% of respondents owned smartphones or other internet-capable devices. 70% had intermediate or advanced mHealth proficiency. Main reasons for using mHealth were appointments (56%), communication with healthcare personnel (56%), laboratory results (55%) and obtaining kidney care information (50%). The main reported concerns with mHealth were privacy & security (18%), and cost (6%). mHealth proficiency was lower in older patients: compared to the 45-65 years (yrs) group, respondents in age groups < 45 yrs, 61-70 yrs, and > 70 yrs had adjusted odds ratio (aOR) of 5.04 (95% Confidence Interval: 2.23-11.38), 0.39 (0.24-0.62), and 0.22 (0.14-0.35) respectively. Compared to those with college education, the aOR associated with below high school and high school only were 0.09 (0.05-0.16) and 0.26 (0.18-0.39) respectively. Hispanic ethnicity (aOR 0.49 [0.31-0.75]) compared with non-Hispanic was associated with lower mHealth proficiency, while employment was associated with higher proficiency (aOR 2.26 [1.18-4.32]). Although home dialysis was associated with higher proficiency in the univariate model, we did not observe this in the fully adjusted model.
Conclusion
The majority of dialysis patients surveyed were ready to use, and proficient in, mHealth. These results are encouraging for the nephrology community to increase endorcement of mHealth technologies in patient care.