mHealth technology for homeless people
Citation: Heaslip V, Richer S, Simkhada B, Dogan H, Green S. Use of Technology to Promote Health and Wellbeing of People Who Are Homeless: A Systematic Review. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2021;18(13):6845.
Language: Full text and abstract only available in EN.
Free to view: Yes.
Funding sources: Burdett Trust.
What is this? The delivery of healthcare services to homeless people may require adjustments because of their limited accessibility. This might include the use of technology to provide mobile health (mHealth) services.
In this systematic review, the authors searched for studies on the use of mHealth-related technology by homeless people and the impact of this technology on health outcomes. They restricted their searches to articles published in English between 2015 and 2021 and did the most recent search on 30 April 2021. They included 17 studies, which were from Canada (2 studies), Spain (1), UK (1) and USA (13).
What was found: The authors of this review concluded that mHealth has the potential to be used for delivering health care to homeless people but that there are several barriers.
Most of the homeless population in these studies owned a mobile phone and made high use of these for communication purposes (calling and texting) but their use for other purposes varied; with common barriers to effective use of mHealth-related technology including limited access to charging points and internet connections, frequent damage from cracked screens and water, theft of phones in shelters and distrust in phones due to fear of tracking and privacy concerns.
The use of online services to seek health advice was found to be higher in homeless people with mental illnesses or who used recreational drugs.
Implications: The authors of the review state that future research should focus on measuring the effects of mHealth interventions on health outcomes in the homeless population, taking into consideration the barriers they face in comparison to people with a residence. They also state that future studies should examine the use of mHealth technology by homeless people in the UK and Europe and in lower income countries.
Other considerations: The authors of the review discuss their findings in the context of age, place of residence and socioeconomic status.
This summary was prepared by Jiewon Lim, edited by Firas Khalid and Luis Gabriel Cuervo, and finalized by Mike Clarke.