Community Health
Community Health Workers’ Usability Assessment of a Digital Health App in African Refugee Camps
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Celina Wille, Ahmad Abu Al Halaweh, Molly Bernstein, Getrude Mphwanthe
This paper highlights the outcomes of a usability assessment conducted on the Mother and Child (MCH) app by SharemyHealth, a digital health platform designed to monitor and track maternal and child nutritional status. Communities affected by disasters—ranging from displacement, to health crises, to natural events—including parts of Malawi and Kenya, face chronic challenges such as overcrowding, resource shortages, and funding deficits, leading to alarmingly high rates of child malnutrition. To address this, IsraAID, an international non-profit organization, partnered with SharemyHealth to enhance the MCH app's usability through a collaborative, user-centered design process. The goal was to enable IsraAID’s Community Health Workers (CHWs) and administrators to more effectively screen, refer, and follow up with cases of child malnutrition. Three-month pilot tests of the app were conducted in Turkana West, Kenya and Blantyre, Malawi, prior to which CHWs were trained in its use. Feedback was collected using an adapted version of the Mobile App Usability Questionnaire (MAUQ), a validated tool for evaluating app usability, including dimensions such as ease of use, interface & satisfaction, and usefulness. We discuss the assessment methodology, findings from data analysis, and performance scores, highlighting the app’s strengths and areas needing improvement. This study underscores the value of iterative, user-centered design in developing effective digital health tools and illustrates their potential for monitoring malnutrition for improving health outcomes in resource-constrained refugee settings. The study also highlights the need for collaboration between sectors in order to address urgent health challenges in the highest risk areas.
Featured Self-care for Flourishing in University Students with Depressive Symptoms: Effects of an Experiential Workshop
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Ithzel Liliana Fernandez Montaño
Depressive symptoms in university students are a risk factor for their academic career and well-being. According to Seligman (2022), the optimal state of mental health and well-being is known as flourishing. All students have the right to develop their full potential, that is, to flourish, and when there are depressive symptoms, this task becomes more complicated, so it is necessary for Psychology to promote strategies for this purpose. The World Health Organization (2022) explains that self-care interventions are the most promising for global healthcare. This is why the objective of this work was to measure the effect of an experiential self-care workshop of 12 sessions, 2 hours a week each, on the depressive symptoms and flourishing of university students. It is a quantitative research, of descriptive scope, with a quasi-experimental design of pretest - intervention - posttest. 30 first-semester students of the Psychology degree from a public university in Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico participated. The Beck Depression Inventory (1996) and the Diener and Biswas-Diener (2009) Flourishing scale were applied. The results show that in all students the score of depressive symptoms decreased at the end of the workshop and those of flourishing increased. It is concluded that a self-care workshop is effective in reducing depressive symptoms in university students and increasing their flourishing. It is suggested to replicate the intervention or carry out other self-care interventions in this population that serve as a protective factor to benefit their mental health.
Garbage, Garbage, Garbage Everywhere: The Influence of Environmental Factors on Human Health
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Esther Lydie Mbobnda Kapche, Firoza Haffejee
The study of human health includes considering environmental factors that have a significant, complex, direct and indirect impact on human health. To better understand the complex interplay of factors between the environment and human health, students were asked to provide photographic evidence of direct environmental factors through exposure and indirect factors through lifestyle and social conditions in their communities. Over four years, undergraduate students in a South African University were asked to capture visual narratives of the influence of the environment on human health. They were working in groups of two to four to identify, photograph, and critically analyze environmental factors affecting health. The findings reveal diverse dimensions of environmental health encompassing air and land pollution due to human behaviors. Littering, illegal dumping sites, industrial emissions, overcrowded accommodations, and informal settlements (houses made of corrugated iron) could lead to respiratory diseases, pests (rats, cockroaches, flies) infestations, and soil contamination. The findings also revealed how students taught the community about the epidemiological importance of having and keeping a clean environment. The study demonstrates the potential of photovoice as a valuable tool for engaging students in public health research and health promotion and education. By incorporating the students' perspectives, this research provides a nuanced understanding of the environmental determinants of health. It offers valuable insights for future public health interventions and policies aimed at fostering healthier and more sustainable communities.
The Need for Radiofrequency Exposure Public Awareness and Policies
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Luis Miguel Martinez Cervantes
The rollout of the fifth generation of mobile telecommunications is bringing new and complex technology to enable high speed and bandwidth communications to end-users. This novel infrastructure is one of the pillars for future Industry 4.0 and Internet of Things. However, it is also bringing new human exposure scenarios in a denser infrastructure of non-ionizing radiating elements to be incorporated in urban, rural and indoor environments. Also is carrying new hazards and risks to end-users and telecommunications industry exposed workers. This panorama may contribute to new public and occupational health problems. Even as there is nearly universal acceptance of exposure limits suggested by the specialized global bodies (v.g. ICNIRP, IEEE) and enforced by local regulating authorities, there are myths and fears amongst the public which suggest a negative perception of such a beneficial technology. This paper focuses on the importance of engineering education and collaborative programs to enhance the safety 5G and millimetric wave radiofrequency (RF) use in electronic communications. Our research shows that occupational fatalities and injuries due to exposure to RF EMF are not recorded in official labor records kept in U.S., U.K. and Mexico. Possible causes of these omissions are an over-emphasis on short-term effects in exposure levels guidelines and lack of substantiated epidemiological data regarding RF safety. Also, we demonstrate the potential benefits in this area from academia and industry collaboration for public and occupational health.
