Mobile health interventions in developing countries: A systematic review

This study reviews the quality of evidence reported in mobile health intervention literature in the context of developing countries. A systematic search of renowned databases was conducted to find studies related to mobile health applications published between a period of 2013 and 2018. After a methodological screening, a total of 31 studies were included for data extraction and synthesis. The mobile health Evidence Reporting and Assessment checklist developed by the World Health Organization was then used to evaluate the rigor and completeness in evidence reporting. We report several important and interesting findings. First, there is a very low level of familiarity with the mobile health Evidence Reporting and Assessment checklist among the researchers and mobile health intervention designers from developing countries. Second, most studies do not adequately meet the essential criteria of evidence reporting mentioned in the mobile health Evidence Reporting and Assessment checklist. Third, there is a dearth of application of design science-based methods and theory-based frameworks in developing mobile health interventions. Fourth, most of the mobile health interventions are not ready for interoperability and to be integrated into the existing health information systems. Based on these findings, we recommend for robust and inclusive study plans to deliver highly evidence-based reports by mobile health intervention studies that are conducted in the context of developing countries.