Department of Human Anatomy, Legal Medicine and History of Science, University of Málaga, 29071 Malaga, Spain.
Instituto de Investigación Biomédica de Málaga (IBIMA), 29010 Malaga, Spain.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021 Nov 27;18(23):12505. doi: 10.3390/ijerph182312505.
There are a large number of mobile applications that allow the monitoring of health status. The quality of the applications is only evaluated by users and not by standard criteria. This study aimed to examine depression-related applications in major mobile application stores and to analyze them using the rating scale tool Mobile Application Rating Scale (MARS). A search of digital applications for the control of symptoms and behavioral changes in depression was carried out in the two reference mobile operating systems, Apple (App Store) and Android (Play Store), by means of two reviewers with a blind methodology between September and October 2019 in stores from Spain and the United Kingdom. Eighteen applications from the Android Play Store and twelve from the App Store were included in this study. The quality of the applications was evaluated using the MARS scale from 1 (inadequate) to 5 (excellent). The average score of the applications based on the MARS was 3.67 ± 0.53. The sections with the highest scores were "Functionality" (4.51) and "Esthetics" (3.98) and the lowest "Application Subjective quality" (2.86) and "Information" (3.08). Mobile Health applications for the treatment of depression have great potential to influence the health status of users; however, applications come to the digital market without health control.
有大量的移动应用程序可以监测健康状况。这些应用程序的质量仅由用户评估，而不是由标准标准评估。本研究旨在检查主要移动应用商店中的与抑郁相关的应用程序，并使用 Mobile Application Rating Scale（MARS）工具对其进行分析。在 2019 年 9 月至 10 月期间，通过两名使用盲法的审阅者，在西班牙和英国的应用商店中，在两个参考移动操作系统（Apple（App Store）和 Android（Play Store））中搜索了用于控制抑郁症状和行为改变的数字应用程序。这项研究共纳入了来自 Android Play Store 的 18 个应用程序和来自 App Store 的 12 个应用程序。使用 MARS 量表从 1（不足）到 5（优秀）评估应用程序的质量。根据 MARS 对应用程序的平均评分是 3.67 ± 0.53。得分最高的部分是“功能”（4.51）和“美学”（3.98），而得分最低的是“应用程序主观质量”（2.86）和“信息”（3.08）。用于治疗抑郁症的移动健康应用程序具有很大的潜力可以影响用户的健康状况；但是，这些应用程序在未经健康控制的情况下就进入了数字市场。
