Backonja Uba, Chi Nai-Ching, Choi Yong, Hall Amanda K, Le Thai, Kang Youjeong, Demiris George
Department of Biomedical Informatics and Health Education, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle WA.
Department of Biobehavioral Nursing and Health Systems, University of Washington School of Nursing, Seattle WA.
J Innov Health Inform. 2016 Oct 10;23(3):860. doi: 10.14236/jhi.v23i3.860.
Health technologies have the potential to support the growing number of older adults who are aging in place. Many tools include visualizations (data visualizations, visualizations of physical representations). However, the role of visualizations in supporting aging in place remains largely unexplored.
To synthesize and identify gaps in the literature evaluating visualizations (data visualizations and visualizations of physical representations), for informatics tools to support healthy aging.
We conducted a search in CINAHL, Embase, Engineering Village, PsycINFO, PubMed, and Web of Science using a priori defined terms for publications in English describing community-based studies evaluating visualizations used by adults aged ≥65 years.
Six out of the identified 251 publications were eligible. Most studies were user studies and varied methodological quality. Three visualizations of virtual representations supported performing at-home exercises. Participants found visual representations either (a) helpful, motivational, and supported their understanding of their health behaviors or (b) not an improvement over alternatives. Three data visualizations supported understanding of one's health. Participants were able to interpret data visualizations that used precise data and encodings that were more concrete better than those that did not provide precision or were abstract. Participants found data visualizations helpful in understanding their overall health and granular data.
Studies we identified used visualizations to promote engagement in exercises or understandings of one's health. Future research could overcome methodological limitations of studies we identified to develop visualizations that older adults could use with ease and accuracy to support their health behaviors and decision-making.
健康技术有潜力支持越来越多居家养老的老年人。许多工具都包含可视化内容（数据可视化、物理表示的可视化）。然而，可视化在支持居家养老方面的作用在很大程度上仍未得到探索。
综合并找出文献中在评估可视化（数据可视化和物理表示的可视化）方面存在的差距，以便为支持健康老龄化的信息学工具提供参考。
我们在护理学与健康领域数据库（CINAHL）、医学与健康领域数据库（Embase）、工程索引数据库（Engineering Village）、心理学文摘数据库（PsycINFO）、医学期刊数据库（PubMed）和科学引文索引数据库（Web of Science）中进行检索，使用预先定义的术语查找以英文发表的、描述基于社区的研究的文献，这些研究评估了65岁及以上成年人使用的可视化工具。
在识别出的251篇出版物中，有6篇符合条件。大多数研究是用户研究，方法学质量参差不齐。三种虚拟表示的可视化支持在家中进行锻炼。参与者发现视觉表示要么（a）有帮助、能激发动力并有助于他们理解自己的健康行为，要么（b）并不比其他方式有改进。三种数据可视化有助于对自身健康的理解。与那些没有提供精确性或较为抽象的数据可视化相比，参与者能够更好地解释使用精确数据和更具体编码的数据可视化。参与者发现数据可视化有助于理解他们的整体健康状况和详细数据。
我们识别出的研究使用可视化来促进锻炼参与或对自身健康的理解。未来的研究可以克服我们识别出的研究的方法学局限性，开发出老年人能够轻松、准确使用的可视化工具，以支持他们的健康行为和决策。
