TY  - JOUR
AU  - Jahnel, Tina
AU  - Pan, Chen-Chia
AU  - Pedros Barnils, Núria
AU  - Muellmann, Saskia
AU  - Freye, Merle
AU  - Dassow, Hans-Henrik
AU  - Lange, Oliver
AU  - Reinschluessel, Anke V
AU  - Rogowski, Wolf
AU  - Gerhardus, Ansgar
PY  - 2024
DA  - 2024/9/12
TI  - Developing and Evaluating Digital Public Health Interventions Using the Digital Public Health Framework DigiPHrame: A Framework Development Study
JO  - J Med Internet Res
SP  - e54269
VL  - 26
KW  - digital public health
KW  - DiPH
KW  - digital health
KW  - public health
KW  - framework
KW  - development
KW  - evaluation
KW  - guidance
KW  - program evaluation
KW  - telemedicine
KW  - intervention
KW  - technological advancement
KW  - opportunity
KW  - technology
KW  - implementation
KW  - digital public health framework
KW  - DigiPHrame
KW  - scoping review
KW  - COVID-19
KW  - contact-tracing app
KW  - contact tracing
AB  - Background: Digital public health (DiPH) interventions may help us tackle substantial public health challenges and reach historically underserved populations, in addition to presenting valuable opportunities to improve and complement existing services. However, DiPH interventions are often triggered through technological advancements and opportunities rather than public health needs. To develop and evaluate interventions designed to serve public health needs, a comprehensive framework is needed that systematically covers all aspects with relevance for public health. This includes considering the complexity of the technology, the context in which the technology is supposed to operate, its implementation, and its effects on public health, including ethical, legal, and social aspects. Objective: We aimed to develop such a DiPH framework with a comprehensive list of core principles to be considered throughout the development and evaluation process of any DiPH intervention. Methods: The resulting digital public health framework (DigiPHrame) was based on a scoping review of existing digital health and public health frameworks. After extracting all assessment criteria from these frameworks, we clustered the criteria. During a series of multidisciplinary meetings with experts from the Leibniz ScienceCampus Digital Public Health, we restructured each domain to represent the complexity of DiPH. In this paper, we used a COVID-19 contact–tracing app as a use case to illustrate how DigiPHrame may be applied to assess DiPH interventions. Results: The current version of DigiPHrame consists of 182 questions nested under 12 domains. Domain 1 describes the current status of health needs and existing interventions; domains 2 and 3, the DiPH technology under assessment and aspects related to human-computer interaction, respectively; domains 4 and 5, structural and process aspects, respectively; and domains 6-12, contextual conditions and the outcomes of the DiPH intervention from broad perspectives. In the CWA use case, a number of questions relevant during its development but also important for assessors once the CWA was available were highlighted. Conclusions: DigiPHrame is a comprehensive framework for the development and assessment of digital technologies designed for public health purposes. It is a living framework and will, therefore, be updated regularly and as new public health needs and technological advancements emerge. 
SN  - 1438-8871
UR  - https://www.jmir.org/2024/1/e54269
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2196/54269
DO  - 10.2196/54269
ID  - info:doi/10.2196/54269
ER  -