Digital health interventions for non-communicable disease management in primary health care in low-and middle-income countries.
systematic_review · Level I
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 36725977.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41746-023-00764-4 and PMC identifier 9889958.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Current evidence on digital health interventions is disproportionately concerned with high-income countries and hospital settings. This scoping review evaluates the extent of use and effectiveness of digital health interventions for non-communicable disease (NCD) management in primary healthcare settings of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) and identifies factors influencing digital health interventions' uptake. We use PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science search results from January 2010 to 2021. Of 8866 results, 52 met eligibility criteria (31 reviews, 21 trials). Benchmarked against World Health Organization's digital health classifications, only 14 out of 28 digital health intervention categories are found, suggesting critical under-use and lagging innovation. Digital health interventions' effectiveness vary across outcomes: clinical (mixed), behavioral (positively inclined), and service implementation outcomes (clear effectiveness). We further identify multiple factors influencing digital health intervention uptake, including political commitment, interactivity, user-centered design, and integration with existing systems, which points to future research and practices to invigorate digital health interventions for NCD management in primary health care of LMICs.