Usability and User Experience Testing of “MyPal for adults” a Co-Designed Electronic Patient-Reported Outcomes (ePROs) app for Adults with Hematologic Malignancies: A Mixed Methods Study (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Mobile health (mHealth) technologies have the potential to enhance cancer patient management, communication, and overall quality of life. The MyPal project, employing a participatory design approach, aims to provide palliative care support for patients with hematological malignancies through an electronic patient-reported outcomes (ePROs) eHealth platform. OBJECTIVE To evaluate the usability and user experience of "MyPal for adults," a co-designed palliative care mobile app intended to support adult patients affected by hematologic malignancies. METHODS Representative users participated in a 4-step usability study employing a think-aloud protocol, complimented with feature satisfaction, difficulty perceived, and design impression surveys along with a short semi-structured interview. Participants were also asked to provide qualitative feedback via the post-use System Usability Scale (SUS), User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ), and Post-study System Usability Questionnaire (PSSUQ). The data were analyzed along the lines of the ISO 9241-210 framework. RESULTS All participants found the intervention content useful, and they reported satisfactory usability, with a mean PSSUQ score of 2.458 and a SUS score of 68.9%. All aspects of the UEQ (Attractiveness, Perspicuity, Efficiency, Dependability, Stimulation, Novelty) surpassed usability quality benchmarks. Identified usability issues primarily related to effectiveness and efficiency as defined in ISO 9241-210. CONCLUSIONS In this study, we conducted a comprehensive usability evaluation of the MyPal for Adults app, a digital tool designed to enhance the palliative care experience. This approach identifies real-world usability issues, enabling iterative improvements in the eHealth platform's design. Our findings reveal a user-friendly interface and positive patient experiences. This study emphasizes the need to enhance palliative care mHealth platform usability, offering insights to improve palliative care for cancer patients.