Wearable for health: 'Bring your own data' for perioperative care
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Wearable for health: Feasibility of 'bring your own data' to support perioperative care
IRAS ID
225670
Contact name
Fiona J MacNeill
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Brighton
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 2 months, 31 days
Research summary
This study considers how information from a smart watch and a smartphone could be accessed and presented to meet the needs of medical professionals providing perioperative care. Smart watches can automatically gather information such as heart rate, activity and elevation from the wearer. This information could be used, with permission from the patient, in the assessment of their health status beyond the clinical setting; from the period prior to an operation through the conclusion of recovery. Recent findings in the Wachter Report (National Advisory Group, 2016, p.30) recommend introduction of methods to enable use of patient-generated information, including information from digital wearable devices. The report highlights the need for a ‘user-centred’ approach to the design of information access methods (National Advisory Group, 2016, p. 30).
This study focuses on the experience of medical professionals as the users of such information access methods. Seeking to understand what information they need, how this information can be interpreted and how the information can be presented to aid interpretation. To gain these insights we will conduct interviews with medical professionals. Patients and patient data are not included, simulated data will be used. This study is motivated by recent publications: Lu et al. (2016), Piwek et al. (2016), Reeder and David (2016), all pointing to the need for usability-specific research to support the use of wearable devices in a healthcare context. To address usability, we must understand the day-to-day requirements of users and consider whether the information provided by the technology matches these needs. This study is also timely due to the recent establishment of the NHS developer web portal (NHS, 2017); to support the creation of health-focused software applications. This study will be conducted to support a dissertation by F. MacNeill as part of an MSc in User Experience Design at University of Brighton.
REC name
London - Westminster Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/LO/2026
Date of REC Opinion
28 Nov 2017
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion