Identifying an effective mobile health application for the self-management of allergic rhinitis and asthma in Australia

Abstract

Objective: People with allergic rhinitis (AR) often self-manage in the community pharmacy setting without consulting health care professionals and trivialize their comorbidities such as asthma. A mobile health application (mHealth app) with a self-monitoring and medication adherence system can assist with the appropriate self-management of AR and asthma. This study aimed to identify an app effective for the self-management of AR and/or asthma.

Methods: MHealth apps retrieved from the Australian Apple App Store and Android Google Play Store were included in this study if they were developed for self-management of AR and/or asthma; in English language; free of charge for the full version; and accessible to users of the mHealth app. The mHealth app quality was evaluated on three domains using a two-stage process. In Stage 1, the apps were ranked along Domain 1 (Accessibility in both app stores). In Stage 2, the apps with Stage 1, maximum score were ranked along Domain 2 (alignment with theoretical principles of the self-management of AR and/or asthma) and Domain 3 (usability of the mHealth app using Mobile App Rating Scale instrument).

Results: Of the 418 apps retrieved, 31 were evaluated in Stage 1 and 16 in Stage 2. The MASK-air achieved the highest mean rank and covered all self-management principles except the doctor’s appointment reminder and scored a total MARS mean score of 0.91/1.

Conclusions: MASK-air is ranked most highly across the assessment domains for the self-management of both AR and coexisting asthma. This mHealth app covers the majority of the self-management principles and is highly engaging.

Keywords:

• Allergic rhinitis
• asthma
• health care professionals
• mobile health applications
• self-management
• suboptimal management

Acknowledgement

The authors would like to thank Elizabeth Azzi (EA) for being part of the panel who assessed the mobile health applications (mHealth apps) for this study.

Declaration of interest

Rachel Tan reports no conflicts of interest. Biljana Cvetkovski reports no conflicts of interest. Vicky Kritikos received honoraria from AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer. Robyn O'Hehir reports no conflicts of interest. Olga Lourenço reports no conflicts of interest. Jean Bousquet reports personal fees and other from Chiesi, Cipla, Hikma, Menarini, Mundipharma, Mylan, Novartis, Sanofi-Aventis, Takeda, Teva, Uriach, other from KYomed-INNOV, from null, outside the submitted work. Sinthia Bosnic-Anticevich is a member of the Teva Pharmaceuticals Devices International Key Experts Panel; received research support from Research in Real Life; payment for lectures/speaking engagements and for developing educational presentations from Teva and Mundipharma; received Honoria from AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, GlaxoSmithKline, for her contribution to advisory boards/key international expert forum.