Enhancing Healthcare Professionals’ Adherence to the MyPal Project Digital Health Intervention Protocol Through Quick Reference Guides

Randomized Clinical Trials (RCTs) are widely used to evaluate new interventions, including digital health solutions, but their complexity can burden Healthcare Professionals (HCPs). The MyPal project, part of the Horizon 2020 initiative, aimed to implement a digital health intervention for patients with hematological malignancies through two distinct studies - the MyPal-ADULT study for adult patients and the MyPal-CHILD study for pediatric patients. Usability issues identified during rehearsal testing led to the creation of Quick Reference Guides (QRGs) to enhance protocol adherence. Co-designed with the MyPal-CHILD intervention team for consistency and tailored to various clinical sites across four European countries, the QRGs improved adherence, as better scores were observed in the Information Quality category of the Post-Study System Usability Questionnaire, with average scores improving from 3.28 (SD: 1.03) in the rehearsal testing phase with 6 participants to 2.43 (SD: 1.02) in the post-RCT evaluation with 14 participants (p = 0.12; Cohen's d = 0.83). Similarly, a single-item feature satisfaction questionnaire question on patient registration showed a decrease in mean scores from 3.00 to 2.43 (Cohen's d = 0.46; p = 0.35).