Background/Purpose: Although juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is one of the most common causes of chronic musculoskeletal pain among youth, families’ decision-making for pain management is not optimal. To provide evidence-based information on a wide range of pain management options, and support a discussion among youth, parents and health care providers, our team is developing a decision support intervention, in the form of an electronic patient decision aid called the JIA Option Map, combined with decision coaching. The objective was to assess the acceptability and usability of a preliminary version of the JIA Option Map from the perspectives of youth and parents.
Methods: The web application, called the JIA Option Map, has been developed using a stepped approach involving youth with JIA, parents and health care providers. To date, five adolescents 13-18 years of age with JIA and five parents were recruited from hospitals and patient groups in Canada and the United States to participate in face-to-face or online semi-structured individual interviews in which they were asked to use the JIA Option Map and describe their thoughts and actions. They also evaluated its usefulness, content, format, and future use. Interviews were audiotaped, transcribed verbatim and analyzed using simple descriptive content analysis.
Results: All participants thought that the JIA Option Map was easy to use, was the appropriate length, had the right amount of information and used a visually-pleasing format. All participants also agreed that it would help them make decisions about pain management, learn about a wide range of treatment options based on their own preferences, and discuss the options with their healthcare team. In addition, youths thought that it would help them be more engaged in choosing pain management options. Participants were particularly satisfied with the wide range of treatment options presented in the web app, which included diets, physical activity and psychological approaches. Participants also liked the user-friendly, evidence-based information summaries presenting probabilities of benefits of treatment options, as well as the links to other online resources. All participants said that they would definitely use the app again and would print or save the summary of the app on their phone to discuss with their health care providers. When using the app, most participants missed the tabs with the complete list of treatment options and their favourites list, which were embedded in another tab, and a few did not see the prompts for more information on scientific studies. They suggested making the tabs and prompts more visible.
Conclusion: Findings revealed that the preliminary version of the JIA Option Map shows good acceptability and usability. Changes will be made to ensure the accessibility of all sections of the web app. These refinements will lead to an improved version that will undergo additional acceptability and usability testing.
The post Acceptability and Usability Testing of a Preliminary Version of the JIA Option Map, an Electronic Decision Aid for Pain Management Options in Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis appeared first on ACR Meeting Abstracts.