JMIR mHealth and uHealth

Over-the-counter (OTC) medicines are frequently used during pregnancy. As these medicines are often used without medical supervision, accessible and reliable safety information is essential. However, finding reliable and understandable information on the safety of these medicines during pregnancy is often experienced as difficult. Hence, there is a need for a new easily accessible electronic health (eHealth) tool that empowers women to actively seek information to support safer self-medication practices during pregnancy and breastfeeding.

Overweight and obesity, as defined by the World Health Organization, correspond to BMI values of 25-29.9 kg/m² for overweight and ≥30 kg/m² for obesity. Both conditions remain major public health challenges worldwide due to their strong link with type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and hypertension, which place a heavy clinical and economic burden on health care systems. In Canada, obesity rates are notably high, with vulnerable populations disproportionately affected due to socioeconomic barriers, limited access to preventive care, and higher comorbidity rates. Calorie-counting Mobile health (mHealth) apps support dietary self-monitoring and weight control; however, varied designs and evidence complicate assessment of feasibility and effectiveness.

Technology-based solutions to support the mental health needs of workers are on the rise, as evidenced by the growing body of research related to e–mental health apps implemented with workers or within the context of workplaces. This expanding landscape of evidence related to mental health apps underscores the necessity of summarizing and consolidating the different ways in which studies are evaluating real-world technology-based interventions in a complex setting such as a workplace.

Wearable fitness trackers have become a valuable tool in public health research due to their ability to collect large-scale, individual-level data at a low cost. Because of this, wearables have the potential to mitigate the urgent need for health research in low-resource settings. However, their use has been largely limited to high-income settings, and a major challenge remains: high rates of missing data. This problem may be exacerbated in low-resource environments where logistical and operational barriers further complicate data collection. Wearable sleep data collected in an urban informal settlement in Uganda during The Onward Project on Well-being and Adversity project revealed substantial challenges related to missingness in low-resource research settings.

College-aged students face persistent academic and social stress that adversely affects their mental and physical health. Digital phenotyping with wearable devices enables real-time stress monitoring from continuous physiological signals, supporting just-in-time therapeutic interventions to improve student well-being. Despite rapid advances in wearables and analytical methods, it remains unclear which devices, physiological signals, and machine learning or deep learning approaches are most commonly used for stress detection in this population.

Suboptimal adoption and engagement rates of digital health applications present challenges to their effectiveness, particularly in chronic disease management such as fibromyalgia. Up to half of patients do not download the prescribed digital health applications or actively engage with them, making effective onboarding a critical opportunity for improvement.

Hematological malignancies are a global health challenge, with a substantial number of deaths each year. Treatment adherence is crucial for improving patient outcomes in patients with hematological malignancies, but resource limitations and logistical challenges hinder optimal outpatient management. Digital health solutions such as the Remote Intelligence for Therapeutic Adherence (RITA) software as a medical device (SaMD) offer potential solutions by facilitating telemedicine visits and supporting patients in managing their treatment.

Exercise prescription is a structured and individualized intervention that requires appropriate progression, tailoring, and behavioral support to ensure safety and long-term effectiveness. With the expansion of mobile health technologies, exercise prescription apps are increasingly used to support the remote delivery of prescribed exercise programs. However, the extent to which widely adopted apps align with established clinical standards remains unclear.

Childhood obesity and unhealthy dietary habits remain major public health concerns and are influenced by the surrounding food environment. Food marketing, particularly for ultraprocessed foods (UPFs), shapes children’s food preferences and consumption. However, food environments are complex and constantly changing, making them difficult to map and monitor. Developing approaches that capture these dynamics is essential to understand and address children’s exposure to unhealthy food marketing.

The comorbidity of dementia and type 2 diabetes mellitus exacerbates the burden on family caregivers (FCGs). Mobile health (mHealth) technology offers a promising alternative to overcome the spatiotemporal limitations of traditional interventions, but evidence for its efficacy in supporting dementia–type 2 diabetes mellitus caregivers remains scarce.

Remote patient monitoring (RPM) is recommended for hypertension control. However, less is known about short-term responses of hypertension to RPM and which program components are most important for hypertension control.

Internet-based cognitive behavioral therapy (iCBT) for the treatment of depression has proven to be an effective and accessible option. However, iCBTs tend to have low adherence rates, which may negatively impact their effectiveness. One such iCBT program is the browser-based, proven-effective iFightDepression (iFD) tool. An app-based version of the iFD tool is the iFD app, which was developed to improve usability with a smartphone. The iFD app provides enhanced usability and a more optimized user experience on mobile devices. Additionally, it offers more comfortable interaction with worksheets, reduced text with added videos, and quicker access to the program via the smartphone icon. These improved usability on smartphones and could have an impact on adherence.