Identifying Requirements of a Self-care System on Smartphones for Preventing Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Smartphone applications play a pivotal role in management, providing care and preventing infectious diseases. It also has the potential impact on supportive and self-care. This study aimed to identify the requirements for a smartphones self-care system to prevent corona-virus (COVID-19).

This was a descriptive study performed in two main stages in 2020. At the first stage, to recognize the requirements for a smartphones self-care system, similar articles were searched and identified. In the second stage, the identified requirements were validated through a researcher-made questionnaire. The sample size of the study consisted of infectious diseases specialists of Urmia University of Medical Sciences. The collected data was analyzed using descriptive statistics (mean and frequency).

Requirements of the self-care system were identified in four areas: "demographic data, clinical requirements, self-care strategies, and technical characteristics". Also, according to the research community, 5 data elements for demographic data, 11 data elements for clinical requirements, 5 data elements for self-care strategies, and 11 data elements for technical characteristics were selected.

Applying the requirements and suggested strategies in the present study can improve self-care skills to prevent corona-virus, symptoms management, motivate and reduce stress, increase personal hygiene and communication with health care providers.