Conceptually Funded Usability Evaluation of an Application for Leveraging Descriptive Data Analysis Models for...

Area of Science:

• Cardiovascular research
• Health informatics
• Usability engineering

Background:

• Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) represent a significant global health burden.
• Descriptive data analysis models are increasingly applied in healthcare for patient data interpretation.
• Evaluating the usability of specialized research applications is crucial for effective adoption.

Purpose of the Study:

• To conceptualize, develop, and validate the usability of a descriptive modeling application for cardiologists.
• To support cardiovascular patient research through enhanced data analysis functionalities.
• To explore and extend existing usability evaluation models for research software.

Main Methods:

• Development of the DESSFOCA (Decision Support System For Cardiologists) application using the R programming language and Shiny.
• Implementation of core functionalities: association rule discovery, clustering, and rule identification within clusters.
• Usability assessment using the System Usability Scale (SUS) and a proposed extension to Van Welie's layered usability model.

Main Results:

• The DESSFOCA application was successfully developed and demonstrated core functionalities for cardiovascular data analysis.
• The System Usability Scale (SUS) provided quantitative data on the application's usability.
• An extended usability model was proposed and evaluated, offering a more comprehensive framework.

Conclusions:

• The DESSFOCA application offers a valuable tool for cardiologists, enhancing research capabilities through descriptive modeling.
• The study validates the importance of usability evaluation in the development of clinical research support systems.
• The proposed extension to the usability model provides a refined approach for assessing complex research applications.