SDAE-A toolkit for developing remote patient monitoring in social, daily activity and related emotion

Abstract

Colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer disease worldwide with highly fatal. It has accounted for 10% of the global cancer incidence (Bray et al., 2018). In the Netherlands, patients who have undergone treatment and surgery for colorectal cancer typically enter a five-year follow-up phase. During this period, patients often experience long-term health issues. Colorectal cancer not only has physical implications for patients but also significantly affects various aspects of their daily lives, including their social networks and mental health (Arndt et al., 2006). On the other hand, remote patient monitoring (RPM) can enhance efficiency and improve patient care delivery. However, there has been a noticeable lack of research and design focusing on the inclusion of social and mental health monitoring within these systems. According to the World Health Organization, health should include “Physical, Social and Mental” aspects. Therefore it’s important to focus on how to develop remote patient monitoring in these aspects.
The project first used a patient community journey map (Jung, 2023) to summarize the experiences of colorectal cancer patients from a large number of posts on an online communication platform and invited medical experts from the Netherlands to a co-creation session to validate the map and explore research directions.
The final research question was defined as: How to develop a remote patient monitoring system for patients’ social and daily activity and related emotion when they are away from the hospital?
The research question was followed by user research. Patients received diary studies, including finishing a probe based on their activities. Upon completion of the diary studies by the patients, there is a follow-up interview to obtain patients' feedback and sentiments regarding the probe. Subsequently, the insights from the user research act as input during a collaborative designers’ brainstorm session. Finally, these research findings were exported into the initial guidelines for developing the RPM in social, daily activity and related emotions for colorectal cancer patients. After evaluations, the final guidelines for colorectal cancer patients’ RPM and a toolkit summarizing the "develop" and "deliver" phases were presented. This toolkit allows future researchers to develop RPM in social and daily activity and related emotion for patients in other contexts besides colorectal cancer patients, supporting the remote patient monitoring system’s evolution of physical, social and mental health.