Usability Based Rating Scale (UBRS) for Evaluation of Mobile Health (mHealth) Applications

Mobile Health (mHealth) applications provide information on public health

care supported by mobile devices, including patient monitoring devices and other

wireless devices. There is no quality assessment tool for the rating of mHealth

applications based on important usability parameters. The primary objective of this

chapter is to present a reliable, multipurpose, comprehensive scale for classifying and

rating the quality of mHealth applications. The newly defined rating scale is primarily

based on the usability parameters extracted from ISO standards, usability guidelines,

and empirical study of literature. Initially, the usability of existing mHealth

applications is evaluated, and their usability barriers are explored. In this study, the

participants were divided into three equal groups, and each group was assigned three

mHealth applications to perform a predefined set of tasks. The applications were

evaluated by using existing five-star rating scale criteria. The user's study reported

mismatched behavior where task performance and efficiency were not aligned with the

application's rating criteria. In this chapter, the taxonomy of usability parameters is

defined and distributed in five different classes. A questionnaire for rating mHealth

applications was also designed, and an overall user rating was calculated by assigning

weight to each question. Other three groups were involved in a second session to

evaluate different mHealth applications using the newly developed usability-based

rating scale (UBRS). It was found that UBRS was compatible with user effectiveness,

efficiency, and satisfaction.

Keywords: Design, eHealth, HCI, Health applications, Interaction design, Interfaces, Mobile applications, mHealth, Rating criteria, Rating scale, Usability, Usability barriers, Usability experience, Usability framework, Usability guidelines, Usability Metrics, Usability parameters, Usability questionnaire, Usability taxonomy, User experience.

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