Abstract
Celiac disease (CD) is a chronic disease treated by maintaining and managing a lifelong restrictive gluten-free diet. The purpose of this study was to develop a mobile application, Plan My C-Day, to promote self-management skills among youth with CD during adolescence—a time when decreased adherence often occurs—and examine its usability among adolescents with CD. Plan My C-Day contains three simulations of activities involving eating out and actions to take when preparing for these events. It was developed and pilot tested by 13 adolescents with CD. Application use and user perception data were collected and analyzed. Participants chose 160 actions within the simulations. For over 75% of participants, the time to complete the simulation decreased from the first to the third (last) simulation by an average of 50%. The average reported usability perception was 3.71 on a scale of 1 to 5, with system ease of use and ease of learning obtaining the highest scores. This study demonstrated that the Plan My C-Day mobile application’s self-management content, features, and functions operated well and that the simulations were easy to understand and complete. Further development will include the option to add self-created activities and adaptation to different languages and cultures.
Highlights
Celiac disease (CD) is a chronic disease triggered by exposure to gluten, a protein found in foods such as wheat, barley, and rye, in people with genetic predisposition to the disease [1]
The objectives of this study were to: (1) design and develop the theoretically based “Plan My C-Day” smartphone application to promote self-management among adolescents with CD, (2) pilot test the use of the Plan My C-Day application, and (3) gather feedback from end users concerning how they perceive the contribution of the application to their self-management, as well as the application’s usability and their general satisfaction from it, to determine its potential and plan further development
Effective self-management skills for a gluten-free diet in CD, which are vital to managing the health condition, involve navigating daily challenges, solving problems, and making decisions [9,12,13]
Summary
Celiac disease (CD) is a chronic disease triggered by exposure to gluten, a protein found in foods such as wheat, barley, and rye, in people with genetic predisposition to the disease [1]. Disease management is a term in health care that expresses the continuous management of chronic conditions over time and the process of people accepting long-term responsibility for themselves and their health conditions [5,6]. Self-management is the interaction of health behaviors and related processes with the lifetime tasks that people engage in to care for themselves and live well with a chronic condition [7,8]. Self-management is a broader concept compared to adherence because it emphasizes the person’s active role in the decision-making process [9]. People with chronic health conditions are responsible for managing their health, including maintaining daily needs and adhering to changes in their lifestyle [14]. Self-management of health and disease has been recognized as a topic of importance and relevance by the European Commission [16]
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