Summary 191 distinct profiles representing different attitudes towards health, healthcare, and eHealth. These profiles converge into two overarching attitudes: the “Optimistically Engaged,” who are generally positive about health, healthcare, and eHealth, and the “Doubtfully Disadvantaged,” who struggle with barriers and have low confidence in managing health and navigating the healthcare system. Our findings challenge the assumption that individuals with lower SEP are uniformly unwilling to adopt healthy behavior and engage with eHealth interventions. Instead, we found a rich diversity of attitudes within this group, with the majority displaying a genuine willingness to embrace health-promoting activities and eHealth interventions. This suggests that the issue may lie less in the unwillingness of the target demographic and more in the design of eHealth interventions themselves. Chapter 3 builds upon our earlier findings regarding the importance of designing eHealth solutions to diverse needs, by exploring how to reach this through participatory design. We present a case study where participatory design methods were specifically applied to develop an eHealth intervention: a smart inhaler to improve medication adherence among asthma patients. This study paid particular attention to individuals with low health literacy, a characteristic often associated with a low SEP, which can be a significant barrier to participation in research and design processes. We focused on three participatory design methods: co-constructing stories, experience prototype exhibition, and video prototype evaluation. We found participatory design activities effectively engaged participants, deepening the understanding of motivations and preferences. The chapter presents the potential and implications of these methods in effectively engaging and designing for and with the target group. Part B: Development of the Knowledge Tool In this part, in Chapter 4, the dissertation delves into the development of our knowledge tool, merging insights from the studies in Part A and the research of Isra Al-Dhahir, a fellow PhD candidate. Our approach, thus far mainly bottom-up, involved direct collaboration with the target group and a hands-on case study. However, to ensure comprehensive understanding, Isra’s work offered a top-down perspective based on existing literature and common barriers and facilitators identified by professionals. This chapter focuses on merging both perspectives to create the Inclusive eHealth Guide (IeG): a practical tool for professionals to design for eHealth equity. Through a participatory approach, we identified 16 requirements for the tool’s design and integrated them into the first version of the IeG.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTk4NDMw