Approaches to participatory technology development and health services research for the development of technical assistance systems
PD Dr. phil. Anna Levke Brütt (Health Sciences)
Prof. Dr. med. Karsten Witt (Medicine, Neurology)
Charlotte Janning (Public Health)
User-centered technology development and participatory health services research share a central aspect: including the target group of the research in the research process (Levelink & Brütt, 2024). The rationale behind both approaches, however, differs. While user-centered technology development focuses on future end-users, without whom the product would not be usable (Merkel & Kucharski, 2019), participatory health services research stems from patients’ initiatives to strengthen participating target groups (Wright, 2021). One central difference is, that participatory health services research requires involvement of the target group throughout the whole research process, whereas user-centered technology development lays focus on the development process. Additionally, evaluation is an explicit aim of participatory health services research (Brütt, 2020). As there exists critique for the selection process of research partners (Lander, Langhof, & Dierks, 2019) and the quality of evaluations tools (Boivin et al., 2018).
This project aims to combine user-centered technology development and health services research to involve target groups in creating specific technical assistance systems for the Research Training Group. Simultaneously the following central questions will be answered to compare both approaches. Methods include a scoping review, online survey, and qualitative interviews:
To answer the first question, a Scoping Review is currently conducted. Its aim is to show the selection process of people for user-centered technology development with health-related focus. Additionally, it is hoped to gain insight about different user-centered developed technologies.