Co-design of a Data Summary Feature with Older Adults as Part of a Digital Health Platform to Support Multimorbidity Self-Management

The ProACT digital health platform helps older people living with multimorbidity (PwMs) to measure symptoms and activities related to their health and well-being, while also allowing them to share this information with their care networks. This paper describes the co-design process used to develop a ‘Data Summary’ (DS) feature within the ProACT platform. Participants were 7 PwMs aged ≥65 years living with ≥2 chronic conditions. Activity-based workshops took place where participants and researchers worked collaboratively to design the DS feature. Interactive activities and guided discussions were inspired by participatory design techniques to promote proactive involvement of participants who may not be familiar with design research. This process revealed that a concise DS displaying a self-selected month of data could help older PwMs to communicate key health information to their healthcare professionals, optimising time-constrained appointments. A colour-coded priority list within the DS would also highlight important health issues that an older PwM could utilise for goal-setting. In conclusion, the rigorous co-design process led to a clear design brief for the new DS feature, guided by 7 individuals who shared their lived experiences of navigating multimorbidity-related health challenges. The contribution of this work lies in an understanding of how to visualise complex data across multiple conditions, that will ultimately support enhanced self-management for older PwMs. A further contribution is the detailed presentation of co-design activities and prompts that may be of use to other researchers.