Key Components of Participatory Design Workshops for Digital Health Solutions: Nominal Group Technique and Feasibility Study
Denecke, Kerstin; Rivera-Romero, Octavio; Giunti, Guido; Van Holten, Karin; Gabarron, Elia (2025-05-14)
Springer
14.05.2025
Denecke, K., Rivera-Romero, O., Giunti, G. et al. Key Components of Participatory Design Workshops for Digital Health Solutions: Nominal Group Technique and Feasibility Study. J Healthc Inform Res (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41666-025-00199-4
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© The Author(s) 2025. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
© The Author(s) 2025. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202505213752
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-202505213752
Tiivistelmä
Abstract
Participatory design (PD) is an essential method in the development of digital health solutions since it promises to increase acceptance, usability, and trust in the developed solution. Although careful planning and preparation is crucial for the success of PD workshops, a framework of key components to consider is still missing. The objective of this work is to develop such framework enriched with examples for aspects to be considered when planning and conducting PD workshops for designing and developing digital interventions in healthcare. We applied the nominal group technique with four participants with backgrounds in computer science, health informatics, psychology, and social anthropology to identify key components of PD workshops. The resulting framework was applied by an expert in PD to a case of a digital health solution for fatigue self-management for multiple sclerosis. The feasibility and applicability of the framework and its shortcomings were assessed. As a result, a framework consisting of five main categories and a total of 36 factors were assigned and defined in relation to the categories. The categories are participatory process, involved persons and their roles, workshop definition, setting, privacy and ethics, including regulations. The application of the framework to the test case demonstrated the feasibility and applicability of the suggested framework as well as the shortcomings of the analyzed PD process. This framework provides practical guidance while highlighting the complexity of PD workshops, encouraging their broad adoption, critical reflection, and continuous refinement. It has potential to improve the conduct of PD workshops and, in this way, potential to improve usability, acceptance, and usefulness of digital health solutions. In future work, the user perspective could be used to extend the framework.
Participatory design (PD) is an essential method in the development of digital health solutions since it promises to increase acceptance, usability, and trust in the developed solution. Although careful planning and preparation is crucial for the success of PD workshops, a framework of key components to consider is still missing. The objective of this work is to develop such framework enriched with examples for aspects to be considered when planning and conducting PD workshops for designing and developing digital interventions in healthcare. We applied the nominal group technique with four participants with backgrounds in computer science, health informatics, psychology, and social anthropology to identify key components of PD workshops. The resulting framework was applied by an expert in PD to a case of a digital health solution for fatigue self-management for multiple sclerosis. The feasibility and applicability of the framework and its shortcomings were assessed. As a result, a framework consisting of five main categories and a total of 36 factors were assigned and defined in relation to the categories. The categories are participatory process, involved persons and their roles, workshop definition, setting, privacy and ethics, including regulations. The application of the framework to the test case demonstrated the feasibility and applicability of the suggested framework as well as the shortcomings of the analyzed PD process. This framework provides practical guidance while highlighting the complexity of PD workshops, encouraging their broad adoption, critical reflection, and continuous refinement. It has potential to improve the conduct of PD workshops and, in this way, potential to improve usability, acceptance, and usefulness of digital health solutions. In future work, the user perspective could be used to extend the framework.
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