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Assessing Parents' Needs in Using Phone Applications to Improve Medication Adherence in an Outpatient Pediatric
Rana Khafagy1, Paul Gibson1,2, Denise Reniers1
1Children's Hospital, London Health Sciences Centre.
Insights
Most parents of children with cancer want to use medication reminder phone apps but don't know about them. They desire specific features like refill notifications and dose tracking to improve adherence.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Oncology
- Digital Health
- Medication Adherence
Background:
- Poor medication adherence in pediatric oncology contributes to significant morbidity and mortality.
- Current medication reminder aids offer limited benefits for improving adherence.
- Phone applications show promise in enhancing adherence for adult and pediatric patients.
Purpose of the Study:
- To determine the interest level of parents of pediatric oncology patients in using phone applications for medication reminders.
- To identify desired features for medication reminder phone applications in pediatric oncology.
Main Methods:
- A single-center observational study involving 45 parents of pediatric oncology patients.
- Questionnaires assessed current app usage, interest in reminder apps, and desired features.
- Participants had children undergoing active cancer treatment and were English-proficient.
Main Results:
- Over 85% of parents expressed high interest in using phone apps for medication adherence.
- Nearly all parents (95.6%) had not previously used such apps.
- Key desired features include refill notifications, dose tracking, customizable schedules, and privacy protection.
Conclusions:
- A majority of parents are interested in medication reminder phone apps but lack awareness of existing options.
- An ideal app should incorporate 10 specific features identified by parents.
- Further research is necessary to validate the effectiveness of recommended phone apps in improving adherence.
Background:
Poor adherence in pediatric oncology leads to significant morbidity and mortality. Currently used medication reminder aids have shown little to no benefit in improving adherence. Phone applications (apps) have demonstrated improved adherence in recent studies involving the adult and pediatric patients. At this time, no pediatric oncology center is recommending a particular phone app.
Objective:
The objective of this study was to determine the proportion of parents of pediatric oncology patients interested in using a phone app for medication reminders and desired features.
Methods:
In this single-center observational trial, 45 questionnaires were completed by parents accompanying their child at a pediatric oncology center. See Supplemental Digital Content 1 (http://links.lww.com/JPHO/A327) for a copy of the questionnaire. Participants had a child on active cancer treatment and were able to read and write English. Primary outcomes included a number of parents currently using a phone app, the number of parents interested in using a phone app, main reasons for not using a phone app and desired phone app features.
Results:
Overall, 95.6% of parents had never used a phone app to aid in medication adherence. Over 85% of these parents were highly interested in using a phone app, but most were not aware of available phone apps to use (57.1%). Desired features included: refill notifications, tracking doses administered, personalizable medication schedule, free of charge, no advertisements, ability to input special instructions, use on multiple devices, unique alarms, tracking child's results, and privacy protection.
Conclusions:
A majority of parents at an outpatient pediatric oncology clinic were interested in using a phone app to assist in medication adherence but were unaware of an available phone app. An ideal criteria list was created with 10 desired features to evaluate available phone apps that may be recommended for this population. Further studies are needed to evaluate if phone apps recommended by this tool improve adherence.
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