Development and evaluation of text messages designed for people with COPD in the mobile pulmonary rehabilitation (m-PR™) platform

Abstract

ObjectiveTo develop and evaluate the ease of understanding and helpfulness of text messages designed to educate, support and motivate people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) as part of an eight-week mobile pulmonary rehabilitation program (m-PR™). Design, participants, setting and outcome measuresText messages were developed in an iterative three stage process: i. development of 85 evidence-based text messages by multidisciplinary health professionals. ii. A survey, including random samples of text messages, was completed by people with COPD who attended a pulmonary rehabilitation assessment at one of five programs in Australia. For each message, participants rated the ease of understanding and helpfulness using a Likert scale and answered an open-ended question seeking feedback. iii. Review of all scores and free text comments informed retention, modification or removal of a text message with the final text messages evaluated for readability. ResultsEighty-six participants with COPD completed the survey (86/100, 86%; mean (standard deviation) age 72 (9) years; 58% female). Each text message was reviewed by a minimum of five participants. The median score for ease of understanding and helpfulness of text message content was 5 (‘strongly agree’) and 4 (‘agree’) respectively. Following review of all text messages, the final bank of 80 text messages had a mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade level of 6. had a mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade level of 6 indicating that the messages were relatively easy to read. ConclusionMost participants with COPD agreed that text messages developed for m-PR™ were easy to understand and helpful. For people with COPD, text messages may educate, support and improve motivation during a pulmonary rehabilitation program. Contribution of Paper•Text messages were designed by multidisciplinary health professionals to support a pulmonary rehabilitation program.•Text messages rated highly by people with COPD for ease of reading and helpfulness, with most participants preferring to receive 1 to 3 text messages per week.•They may be an additional ‘tool’ to provide or complement ongoing support and education.