Priorities and design principles for a mobile health (mHealth) application to support self-management of post-stroke aphasia: experience gathering and prioritisation within an experience-based co-design approach.

Purpose

(1) To map experiences of accessing and adhering to community-based aphasia therapy and establish priorities for improvement, based on lived experience. (2) To identify design principles for the experience-based co-design (EBCD) of a mobile health self-management application.

Materials And Methods

EBCD and human-centred design. Experience gathering and prioritisation (stages 1-3) with people with aphasia (n = 13), significant others (n = 8), and health professionals (n = 10) in interviews and focus groups. Experiences were analysed thematically to identify unmet needs and touchpoints. Priorities were established using the nominal group technique and mapped to technology design principles.

Results

Five touchpoints were identified: (1) The great divide; (2) Too many roadblocks; (3) Getting enough therapy that's right for me; (4) A need to see progress; (5) Finding new ways to bridge the therapy gap. Priorities were synthesised into seven themes and mapped to five design principles: (1) connects the person with aphasia with their speech pathologist, significant others, and community; (2) links goals-therapy-outcomes; (3) shows progress visually; (4) supports information finding and sharing; and (5) is customisable and accessible.

Conclusion

A customisable mHealth solution that facilitates connections and information finding, links goals, therapy, and outcomes, and tracks progress over time, may support aphasia self-management.