mHealth Interventions for Treatment Adherence and Outcomes of Care for Cardiometabolic Disease Among Adults Living With HIV: Systematic Review

Abstract

Background The success of antiretroviral therapy has led to an increase in life expectancy and an associated rise in the risk of cardiometabolic diseases (CMDs) among people living with HIV. Objective Our aim was to conduct a systematic review to synthesize the existing literature on the patterns of use and effects of mobile health (mHealth) interventions for improving treatment adherence and outcomes of care for CMD among people living with HIV. Methods A systematic search of multiple databases, including PubMed-MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Science, African Journals online, ClinicalTrials.gov, and the World Health Organization Global Index Medicus of peer-reviewed articles, was conducted with no date or language restrictions. Unpublished reports on mHealth interventions for treatment adherence and outcomes of care for CMD among adults living with HIV were also included in this review. Studies were included if they had at least 1 component that used an mHealth intervention to address treatment adherence or 1 or more of the stated outcomes of care for CMD among people living with HIV. Results Our search strategy yielded 1148 unique records. In total, 10 articles met the inclusion criteria and were included in this review. Of the 10 studies, only 4 had published results. The categories of mHealth interventions ranged from short messaging, telephone calls, and wearable devices to smartphone and desktop web-based mobile apps. Across the different categories of interventions, there were no clear patterns in terms of consistency in the use of a particular intervention, as most studies (9/10, 90%) assessed a combination of mHealth interventions. Short messaging and telephone calls were however the most common interventions. Half of the studies (5/10, 50%) reported on outcomes that were indirectly linked to CMD, and none of them provided reliable evidence for evaluating the effectiveness of mHealth interventions for treatment adherence and outcomes of care for CMD among people living with HIV. Conclusions Due to the limited number of studies and the heterogeneity of interventions and outcome measures in the studies, no definitive conclusions could be drawn on the patterns of use and effects of mHealth interventions for treatment adherence and outcomes of care for CMD among people living with HIV. We therefore recommend that future trials should focus on standardized outcomes for CMD. We also suggest that future studies should consider having a longer follow-up period in order to determine the long-term effects of mHealth interventions on CMD outcomes for people living with HIV. Trial Registration PROSPERO International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews CRD42018086940; https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42018086940

Lack of ownership of mobile phones could hinder the rollout of mHealth interventions in Africa

“…Throughout Africa, many pilot mHealth interventions have been launched to manage Ebola ( Tom-Aba et al, 2018 ), maternal health ( Ag Ahmed et al, 2017 ; Mildon and Sellen, 2019 ; Onukwugha et al, 2022 ), and various childhood ailments ( Mahmood et al, 2020 ). To date, the majority of mHealth interventions that have been implemented in Africa have focused on using SMS/texting to improve treatment adherence and patient retention ( Kruse et al, 2019 ; Manby et al, 2022 ; Odukoya et al, 2021 ); notably, such interventions only require access to BPs. Studies of these interventions have shown that weekly text messaging to HIV patients that are literate (and voice-enabled systems for illiterate patients) have substantially improved adherence to medication and increased retention in care.…”

An Investigation Into the Use of mHealth in Musculoskeletal Physiotherapy: Scoping Review

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