gms | German Medical Science

20. Deutscher Kongress für Versorgungsforschung

Deutsches Netzwerk Versorgungsforschung e. V.

06. - 08.10.2021, digital

Impacts of symptom checker apps on health care professionals in general practice – a scoping review

Meeting Abstract

  • Natalia Radionova - UKT Tübingen, Institut für Arbeitsmedizin, Sozialmedizin und Versorgungsforschung, Tübingen, Deutschland
  • Eylem Ög - UKT Tübingen, Institut für Arbeitsmedizin, Sozialmedizin und Versorgungsforschung, Tübingen, Deutschland
  • Monika Rieger - UKT Tübingen, Institut für Arbeitsmedizin, Sozialmedizin und Versorgungsforschung, Tübingen, Deutschland
  • Christine Preiser - UKT Tübingen, Institut für Arbeitsmedizin, Sozialmedizin und Versorgungsforschung, Tübingen, Deutschland

20. Deutscher Kongress für Versorgungsforschung (DKVF). sine loco [digital], 06.-08.10.2021. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2021. Doc21dkvf167

doi: 10.3205/21dkvf167, urn:nbn:de:0183-21dkvf1679

Published: September 27, 2021

© 2021 Radionova et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. See license information at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.


Outline

Text

Background: Symptom checker apps (SCA) “provide people with a possible alternative diagnosis based on their reported symptoms and/or suggest a course of action (self-care, General Practioners appointment to go to emergency)” (Chambers et al. 2019). Little is known about the impact of SCA on Health Care Professionals (HCP). As a subproject of the BMBF-funded collaborative project “CHECK.APP Symptom-Checker Apps based on Artificial Intelligence. A multi-perspective analysis of ethical, legal and social implications“ (03/2020–02/2023), we explore which work-related stressors and resources for General Practitioners are associated with SCA. In addition, we are conducting this scoping review (ScR) according to the PRISMA ScR Guidelines through our own funding.

Aims and objectives: What is known from the literature about the impacts of SCA on HCPs, particularly with regard to perceived stress and psychosocial demands and resources related to work content and organization, HCP-patient interaction/relationship, HCPs professional self-image?

Methods: Initially, PubMed (Medline) and CINAHL were searched using keywords and MeSH terms. The search strategy was developed and consisted of 3 main concepts: “medical apps”; “m-health”; “(self-)diagnosis”. Later on, the pool of titles was supplemented through eligible publications identified through reference screening and manual search. Titles and abstracts were selected based on pre-defined inclusion criteria. Inclusion criteria were defined using the PCC (population-concept-context) scheme (Peters et al. 2015). HCPs were defined as the relevant population and general practice as the relevant context. The studies with the focus on artificial intelligence or algorithm-based SCA for the general public (concept) were included.

All publication types between 2000–2021 in English, German, French, Turkish or Russian language and in full text were included.

The entire process was conducted by two independent researchers and discussed on an ongoing basis.

Results: Our first results on searching and selecting relevant studies are presented here. 2,136 studies were identified through the main search strategy. The pre-screening of the selected publications shows that there are few empirical studies on topics such as the impacts of SCA on HCPs work content/work, organization/service utilization, job satisfaction, perceived stress, HCP-patient relationship and communication, and professional self-concept. The topic of perceived work-related stress has been especially under-researched to date.

Discussion: SCAs are not a completely new phenomenon, but continue trends towards digitally pre-informed patients in primary care. Little is known about the impacts of this on the work-related stress of HCPs in this field.

Practical implications: There are prominent gaps in literature surrounding the impacts of artificially intelligent self-diagnosing apps/tools on HCPs in general practice. The interviews in the context of CHECK.APP aim to fill this gap.

Appeal to science and practice: More empirical research on work-related exposures to SCA is needed.