Bewick BM, Ondersma SJ, Hoybye MT, et al. (2017). Key intervention characteristics in e-health: Steps towards standardized communication. International Journal of Behavioral Medicine. doi: 10.1007/s12529-016-9630-3
In this study, researchers attempted to identify a common set of characteristics of digital health interventions and develop a visualization tool to communicate these characteristics to facilitate the standardization of describing digital health interventions. An iterative conversation between the authors resulted in a list of 25 intervention characteristics. Researchers then contacted 123 researchers who had been authors on papers relating to digital health interventions. Of these, 44 participants reported having had at least some experience with digital health interventions and agreed to participate. Participants were asked to rate the importance of each characteristic as a descriptor of a digital health intervention and then identify the five most important characteristics. The behavioral target, change technique used, type of technology used, and level of counselor involvement had the highest percentages of participants giving it the highest importance rating, placing it in the top five, and rating it as the first or second most important characteristic. Six descriptive characteristics (i.e. behavioral target, target population, change approach or technique used, technology used, intended setting, cost to user) and four quantifiable characteristics (i.e. intervention duration, extent of theoretical basis, tailoring of content, counselor involvement) were consistently identified as important and were integrated into the visualization tool.