A Research on the Classification and Applicability of the Mobile Health Applications

Abstract

Mobile health applications are applied for different purposes. Healthcare professionals and other users can use this type of mobile applications for specific tasks, such as diagnosis, information, prevention, treatment, and communication. This paper presents an analysis of mobile health applications used by healthcare professionals and their patients. A secondary objective of this article is to evaluate the scientific validation of these mobile health applications and to verify if the results provided by these applications have an underlying sound scientific foundation. This study also analyzed literature references and the use of mobile health applications available in online application stores. In general, a large part of these mobile health applications provides information about scientific validation. However, some mobile health applications are not validated. Therefore, the main contribution of this paper is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the usability and user-perceived quality of mobile health applications and the challenges related to scientific validation of these mobile applications.This work was funded by FCT/MCTES through national funds and when applicable co-funded EU funds under the project UIDB/EEA/50008/2020 (Este trabalho é financiado pela FCT/MCTES através de fundos nacionais e quando aplicável cofinanciado por fundos comunitários no âmbito do projeto UIDB/EEA/50008/2020)