Use of short message service for monitoring Zika-related behaviors in four Latin American countries: lessons learned from the field

The use of mobile phones for the prevention and control of arboviral diseases: a scoping review

BACKGROUND

The rapid expansion of dengue, Zika and chikungunya with large scale outbreaks are an increasing public health concern in many countries. Additionally, the recent coronavirus pandemic urged the need to get connected for fast information transfer and exchange. As response, health programmes have -among other interventions- incorporated digital tools such as mobile phones for supporting the control and prevention of infectious diseases. However, little is known about the benefits of mobile phone technology in terms of input, process and outcome dimensions. The purpose of this scoping review is to analyse the evidence of the use of mobile phones as an intervention tool regarding the performance, acceptance, usability, feasibility, cost and effectiveness in dengue, Zika and chikungunya control programmes.

METHODS

We conducted a scoping review of studies and reports by systematically searching: i) electronic databases (PubMed, PLOS ONE, PLOS Neglected Tropical Disease, LILACS, WHOLIS, ScienceDirect and Google scholar), ii) grey literature, using Google web and iii) documents in the list of references of the selected papers. Selected studies were categorized using a pre-determined data extraction form. Finally, a narrative summary of the evidence related to general characteristics of available mobile health tools and outcomes was produced.

RESULTS

The systematic literature search identified 1289 records, 32 of which met the inclusion criteria and 4 records from the reference lists. A total of 36 studies were included coming from twenty different countries. Five mobile phone services were identified in this review: mobile applications (n = 18), short message services (n=7), camera phone (n = 6), mobile phone tracking data (n = 4), and simple mobile communication (n = 1). Mobile phones were used for surveillance, prevention, diagnosis, and communication demonstrating good performance, acceptance and usability by users, as well as feasibility of mobile phone under real life conditions and effectiveness in terms of contributing to a reduction of vectors/ disease and improving users-oriented behaviour changes. It can be concluded that there are benefits for using mobile phones in the fight against arboviral diseases as well as other epidemic diseases. Further studies particularly on acceptance, cost and effectiveness at scale are recommended.

Utility of Short Message Service (SMS) for Remote Data Collection for HIV in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

Short message system (SMS) communication is widespread in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and may be a viable approach to address challenges with in-person data collection for HIV-related research and monitoring and evaluation. We reviewed the literature to characterize potential benefits and challenges with using SMS for remote data capture, including examples from HIV and sexual and reproductive health.

RECENT FINDINGS

In our review, we found that studies that have used SMS to capture sensitive, self-reported data found this was an acceptable and feasible strategy, and may reduce social desirability bias of self-reported data; but studies are limited. Shared phones and privacy concerns have been described as challenges, but can be addressed with enhanced security features. Response rates to SMS surveys varied significantly by topic, population, and setting. SMS may improve generalizability and precision of health and behavior data for HIV in research and programs, but use in LMICs is limited. SMS systems should be carefully designed to overcome potential implementation hurdles.

The Utility of SMS to Report Male Partner HIV Self-testing Outcomes Among Women Seeking Reproductive Health Services in Kenya: Cohort Study

Background

Use of SMS for data collection is expanding, but coverage, bias, and logistical constraints are poorly described.

Objective

The aim of this study is to assess the use of SMS to capture clinical outcomes that occur at home and identify potential biases in reporting compared to in-person ascertainment.

Methods

In the PrEP Implementation in Young Women and Adolescents program, which integrated pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) into antenatal care, postnatal care, and family planning facilities in Kisumu County, Kenya, HIV-negative women 14 years of age or older were offered oral HIV self-tests (HIVSTs) to take home to male partners. Women that brought a phone with a Safaricom SIM to the clinic were offered registration in an automated SMS system (mSurvey) to collect information on HIVST outcomes. Women were asked if they offered the test to their male partners, and asked about the test process and results. HIVST outcomes were collected via SMS (sent 2.5 weeks later), in-person (if women returned for a follow-up scheduled 1 month later), or using both methods (if women initiated PrEP, they also had scheduled follow-up visits). The SMS prompted women to reply at no charge. HIVST outcomes were compared between women with scheduled follow-up visits and those without (follow-up visits were only scheduled for women who initiated PrEP). HIVST outcomes were also compared between women reporting via SMS and in-person.

Results

Among 2123 women offered HIVSTs and mSurvey registration, 486 (23.89%) accepted HIVSTs, of whom 359 (73.87%) were eligible for mSurvey. Additionally, 76/170 (44.7%) women with scheduled follow-up visits and 146/189 (77.3%) without scheduled follow-up visits registered in mSurvey. Among the 76 women with scheduled follow-ups, 62 (82%) had HIVST outcomes collected: 19 (31%) in-person, 20 (32%) by SMS, and 23 (37%) using both methods. Among the 146 women without scheduled visits, 87 (59.6%) had HIVST outcomes collected: 3 (3%) in-person, 82 (94%) by SMS, and 2 (2%) using both methods. SMS increased the collection of HIVST outcomes substantially for women with scheduled follow-up visits (1.48-fold), and captured 82 additional reports from women without scheduled follow-up visits. Among 222 women with reported HIVST outcomes, frequencies of offering partners the HIVST (85/95, 89% in-person vs 96/102, 94% SMS; P=.31), partners using the HIVST (83/85, 98% vs 92/96, 96%; P=.50), women using HIVST with partners (82/83, 99% vs 91/92, 99%; P=.94), and seeing partner’s HIVST results (82/83, 99% vs 89/92, 97%; P=.56) were similar between women reporting in-person only versus by SMS only. However, frequency of reports of experiencing harm or negative reactions from partners was more commonly reported in the SMS group (17/102, 16.7% vs 2/85, 2%; P=.003). Barriers to the SMS system registration included not having a Safaricom SIM or a functioning phone.

Conclusions

Our results suggest that the use of SMS substantially improves completeness of outcome data, does not bias reporting of nonsensitive information, and may increase reporting of sensitive information.  

Using Mobile Phone Data for Emergency Management: a Systematic Literature Review

Emergency management (EM) has always been a concern of people from all walks of life due to the devastating impacts emergencies can have. The global outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020 has pushed EM to the top topic. As mobile phones have become ubiquitous, many scholars have shown interest in using mobile phone data for EM. This paper presents a systematic literature review about the use of mobile phone data for EM that includes 65 related articles written between 2014 and 2019 from six electronic databases. Five themes in using mobile phone data for EM emerged from the reviewed articles, and a systematic framework is proposed to illustrate the current state of the research. This paper also discusses EM under COVID-19 pandemic and five future implications of the proposed framework to guide future work.