Identifying the Components of Mobile Value-Added Services in Health: A Qualitative Approach

Extended Abstract
Background
Health is an important area for using mobile value-added services. These services can have a high capacity to respond to health and medical needs in various areas such as prevention, diagnosis, treatment, disease management, education, promotion of healthy behaviors, improving communication and interaction between patient and doctor. Mobile value-added services in the health sector have economic benefits in addition to health and medical benefits. Despite the benefits and potentials of mobile value-added services in the health sector, the use of these services in society faces challenges and limitations. One of these challenges is the lack of identification of factors affecting the implementation of these services, which prevents the design and implementation of appropriate strategies for promoting and expanding them at the community level. Therefore, it is necessary to identify and analyze the dimensions and components affecting the implementation of mobile value-added services in the health sector.
Methods
This applied research used qualitative data to identify the dimensions and components of mobile value-added services in the health sector by content analysis. This method is suitable for the purpose of the research because it provides the possibility of generating patterns, themes, and components related to a phenomenon by analyzing textual data. For data collection, library method was used. In this way, the available texts and sources related to mobile value-added services were extracted. Foreign databases, including ScienceDirect, Springer, Wiley, IEEE, and PubMed were selected between 2010 and 2023 using the following keywords: “mobile in healthcare”, “mobile value creation”, “m-health”, and “mobile value-added in health”. Meanwhile, we searched Iranian databases, including IranDoc, Magiran, and SID using the following keywords: “value-added mobile services”, “mobile health”, and “value-added in health sector”. After searching the databases, 74 documents, including articles, dissertations, and books were identified, which were considered as qualitative data. For theme analysis, a three-step process with six steps and 20 actions was used. This process, unlike linear processes, requires a round-trip process in the entire data set. These steps included getting to know the codes, creating primary codes and coding, searching and recognizing themes, drawing the network of themes, analyzing the network of themes, and compiling a report. However, to achieve accurate and practical results, it was necessary to go through each step of this process with precision and detail and return if needed to achieve better results. The results of the qualitative part were presented to five experts, and they were asked to express their opinion about the identified themes and their relevance to the objectives. After collecting the opinions and feedback of the experts, the necessary changes were applied, and some of the basic themes were combined based on the similarities. As a result, new basic themes were identified, and some were modified. Therefore, the validity of this research was determined based on the degree of relationship between the components and the model of mobile value-added services in the health sector based on expert opinions. Also, to check the reliability of coding, it was done twice. After placing the codes and values in the above relation, the reliability coefficient was 97%, which indicated a high reliability.
Results
Based on the findings of this research, the mobile value-added service model in the field of health has six main dimensions, including users' understanding, effects and consequences, technology development, effective environmental conditions, reliability, mentality and expectations. These mentioned dimensions have 16 components. The dimension of user perception refers to organizing themes of understanding benefits, understanding welfare, and user values. The dimension of effects and consequences refers to organizing themes of customer outcomes, community outcomes, and organizational outcomes. The dimension of technology development refers to organizing themes of technology infrastructure and reducing fear of technology. The dimension of environmental influencing conditions refers to organizing themes of learning and development, occupational factors, support and incentives. The dimension of reliability refers to organizing themes of technical reliability, human reliability, and risk reduction. Finally, the dimension of mindset and expectations refers to organizing themes of attitude and expectation.
Conclusion
In this research, we examined the components and dimensions of using mobile phone value-added services in the field of health. Our results showed that using mobile value-added services in the field of health was related to the agency of mentality and technology. These services have positive and negative consequences that should be considered in design and implementation phases. Mobile value-added services in the field of health can create new opportunities to provide medical services to society. As a result, it can save time and money, improve access to medical services, increase health information, improve health behaviors of users, and improve the interaction between patients and doctors. The results of this research can help policymakers, planners, implementers, and users of health services to use mobile value-added services in the field of health in a comprehensive and scientific manner.