Access and usage of mobile health (mHealth) for communication, health monitoring, and decision-making among patients with multiple chronic diseases (comorbidities)

Multiple co-existing chronic diseases impact patients' ability to manage their medical conditions. MHealth provides opportunities for continuous access to and better quality of care. This study explored access to mHealth and its Usage among people with comorbidities. Based on Social Cognitive Theory (SCT), this study also explores how environmental factors (quality of care and having a regular provider) and personal factors (self-efficacy and perception of health status) can impact behavioral factors (mHealth use for communication, health monitoring, and decision-making) of people with comorbidities. Multivariate logistic regression models use Health Information National Trends Survey data (2020-2021). The study included 9303 participants, and 3260 of them had comorbidities. The hypotheses are tested on people with comorbidities who used mHealth for health purposes. The use of mHealth to monitor health-related issues was significantly correlated with comorbidity. Having a regular provider impacts the decision to use mHealth for health monitoring, communication, and decision-making. Self-efficacy perception of patients with comorbidities impacts their use of mHealth for health monitoring and decision-making. Finally, a good perception of health status impacts the use of mHealth for health monitoring. Even though different factors impact different behaviors, the findings support the hypotheses of the social cognitive theory linking the person's behavior to their perceptions and environmental factors. These findings extend the literature supporting the validity of the social cognitive theory in healthcare applications and give insights into the importance of mHealth in supporting care for patients with comorbidities.