The University of Sydney in collaboration with eight Australian research institutions and Imperial College London conducted a global cross-sectional study on the use of technology for health purposes during the pandemic.
The study published in PLOS Digital Health, aimed to examine mobile applications for health care, physical activity monitoring, or related to COVID-19 in adults during the pandemic. These in order to find or establish a relationship between the use of this type of application and healthy behaviors or habits.
The method used was a cross-sectional survey applied online between June and September 2020. The survey was independently developed and reviewed by the co-authors to establish its validity. The association between the use of the aforementioned mobile apps and health-related habits were examined using a multivariate logistic regression model, which is a technique used to estimate the relationship between variables or sets of variables.
The survey included the participation of 552 adults (76.71 TP2T women and 23.31 TP2T men) from 32 countries, although the majority were Australians. The self-reported survey showed that 60% of adults used a mobile app for health-related reasons during the pandemic while 38% used apps to track their physical activity.
Although they are not specialized applications to promote healthy habits, the most used apps for this purpose were Zoom, Facebook and YouTube. However, 83% of people responded that they used health apps during the pandemic to stay active; the 37% to connect with other people, the 33% to manage your mental health, the 26% to eat healthy and the 26% to sleep better.
Physical activity-related applications were used by the participants' 80% to record and monitor their activity level and the 60% to follow exercise videos. Likewise, the 30% said they use this type of app to take classes live and the 34% to share their progress on social networks.
The study showed that people who reported using health-related mobile apps were more likely to be active. “This shows that technology can play an important role in helping to promote healthy behaviors, even during the unique circumstances of the pandemic. We should learn from this as we look to improve health care and accessibility in the future because keeping people on track with healthy habits is key to preventing chronic disease." explains researcher Huong Ly Tong, lead author of the study.
However, the study also showed the negative aspects of technology in health during the pandemic, specifically the use of social networks. Dr. Liliana Laranjo, Senior Research Fellow in Digital Health at the Westmead Center for Applied Research at the University of Sydney School of Medicine and Health, explained that health apps have helped people find a sense of normalcy and stay active and connected.
"Sometimes they also had a negative emotional impact when people felt exposed to too much information about COVID-19 online or when they felt they weren't meeting their fitness goals on the trackers," he explained.
Huong Ly Tong explains that more research is needed on this topic, as well as solid clinical trials that can promote greater personalization and adaptability of mobile apps. We invite you to consult the complete study in the following link https://journals.plos.org/digitalhealth/article?id=10.1371/journal.pdig.0000087
