Second Floor of George Campbell Building, Department of Public Health Medicine, School of Nursing and Public Health, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Howard College Campus, Durban, 4001, South Africa.
Research for Sustainable Development Consult, Sunyani, Ghana.
BMC Med Inform Decis Mak. 2021 Jan 6;21(1):11. doi: 10.1186/s12911-020-01381-x.
The rapid growth of mobile technology has given rise to the development of mobile health (mHealth) applications aimed at treating and preventing a wide range of health conditions. However, evidence on the use of mHealth in high disease burdened settings such as sub-Sharan Africa is not clear. Given this, we systematically mapped evidence on mHealth for disease diagnosis and treatment support by health workers in sub-Saharan Africa.
We conducted a scoping review study guided by the Arksey and O'Malley's framework, Levac et al. recommendations, and Joanna Briggs Institute guidelines. We thoroughly searched the following databases: MEDLINE and CINAHL with full text via EBSCOhost; PubMed; Science Direct and Google Scholar for relevant articles from the inception of mHealth technology to April 2020. Two reviewers independently screened abstracts and full-text articles using the eligibility criteria as reference. This study employed the mixed methods appraisal tool version 2018 to assess the methodological quality of the included studies.
Out of the 798 articles identified, only 12 published articles presented evidence on the availability and use of mHealth for disease diagnosis and treatment support by health workers in SSA since 2010. Of the 12 studies, four studies were conducted in Kenya; two in Malawi; two in Nigeria; one in South Africa; one in Zimbabwe; one in Mozambique, and one in Lesotho. Out of the 12 studies, one reported the use of mHealth for diseases diagnosis; three reported the use of mHealth to manage HIV; two on the management of HIV/TB; two on the treatment of malaria; one each on the management of hypertension; cervical cancer; and three were not specific on any disease condition. All the 12 included studies underwent methodological quality appraisal with a scored between 70 and 100%.
The study shows that there is limited research on the availability and use of mHealth by health workers for disease diagnosis and treatment support in sub-Saharan Africa. We, therefore, recommend primary studies focusing on the use of mHealth by health workers for disease diagnosis and treatment support in sub-Saharan Africa.
移动技术的快速发展催生了移动医疗（mHealth）应用的发展，旨在治疗和预防各种健康状况。然而，在撒哈拉以南非洲等疾病负担沉重的环境中使用 mHealth 的证据尚不清楚。有鉴于此，我们系统地绘制了撒哈拉以南非洲卫生工作者使用 mHealth 进行疾病诊断和治疗支持的证据图。
我们按照 Arksey 和 O'Malley 的框架、Levac 等人的建议以及 Joanna Briggs 研究所的指南进行了一项范围综述研究。我们彻底搜索了以下数据库：通过 EBSCOhost 全文搜索 MEDLINE 和 CINAHL；PubMed；Science Direct 和 Google Scholar，以获取 2010 年以来 mHealth 技术出现以来与撒哈拉以南非洲相关的文章。两名评审员使用资格标准作为参考，独立筛选摘要和全文文章。本研究采用混合方法评估工具 2018 版评估纳入研究的方法学质量。
在确定的 798 篇文章中，只有 12 篇发表的文章自 2010 年以来提供了关于撒哈拉以南非洲卫生工作者使用 mHealth 进行疾病诊断和治疗支持的证据。在这 12 项研究中，有 4 项在肯尼亚进行；2 项在马拉维；2 项在尼日利亚；1 项在南非；1 项在津巴布韦；1 项在莫桑比克；1 项在莱索托。在这 12 项研究中，有 1 项报告了 mHealth 在疾病诊断中的应用；3 项报告了 mHealth 用于管理艾滋病毒；2 项用于管理艾滋病毒/结核病；2 项用于治疗疟疾；1 项用于管理高血压；1 项用于宫颈癌；3 项未具体说明任何疾病状况。所有 12 项纳入的研究都进行了方法学质量评估，得分在 70 到 100 之间。
研究表明，在撒哈拉以南非洲，关于卫生工作者使用 mHealth 进行疾病诊断和治疗支持的研究有限。因此，我们建议进行侧重于撒哈拉以南非洲卫生工作者使用 mHealth 进行疾病诊断和治疗支持的研究。
