Usability in digital social and healthcare services from citizens' point of view – a narrative literature review
Hotanen, Eveliina (2024)
2024
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-202404106230
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-202404106230
Tiivistelmä
Digital services have changed many industries and implemented new ways to produce services that used to require travelling, phone calls or paper forms. Digital services offer services that are no longer tied to a certain physical place or time. Digital services are hoped to offer easier, quicker and more cost-efficient services to citizens and professionals. People have gotten used to digital services and also expect that digital services are available. Public social and healthcare services have struggled to implement digital services and the change has been slower to adapt them than in other industries. The usability of digital services directly effects how easily the services are taken into use and how eager people are to use them.
The purpose of this thesis was to identify factors that increase or reduce usability of digital social and healthcare services from the citizens' point of view. The aim of the thesis was to gather this information for the client, 2M-IT Oy, for developing or evaluating digital social or healthcare services that are designed for the citizen users.
The chosen method for thesis research was the narrative literature review. The material gathered for the study was analyzed with an inductive content analysis. The research method was chosen to reach a wide overview of the topic. The literature review data consisted of nine studies and the data was gathered from CINAHL Ultimate and Science Direct databases. The dataset was limited to years 2020-2023 and search keywords included usability, user experience, digital, digital health service and digital social service.
The research results showcased that similar usability factors were represented in many studies, regardless of the service's specification or type of service. Usability was found to increase when users experienced that they were offered useful services, designed for the users needs and that the services were easy to use, guiding the user and providing clear information in a simple language and preferably in different types of forms such as interactive elements or in dynamic content. Usability was found to reduce when the service provided too much information in text form, included medicalized terms, lacked sufficient user guidance and included design choices that made the service complicated and unintuitive.
This thesis combines information about usability factors from the citizen users' perspective. This knowledge is especially useful when evaluating digital services and designing them for this user segment. Good usability is a key factor in digital services no matter what industry they involve. Especially important it is in digital services that are targeted to citizens that have very heterogenic backgrounds and digital skills, and are not experts of the structures in social and healthcare and in most cases do not possess as much information in social and healthcare literacy as professionals do.
The purpose of this thesis was to identify factors that increase or reduce usability of digital social and healthcare services from the citizens' point of view. The aim of the thesis was to gather this information for the client, 2M-IT Oy, for developing or evaluating digital social or healthcare services that are designed for the citizen users.
The chosen method for thesis research was the narrative literature review. The material gathered for the study was analyzed with an inductive content analysis. The research method was chosen to reach a wide overview of the topic. The literature review data consisted of nine studies and the data was gathered from CINAHL Ultimate and Science Direct databases. The dataset was limited to years 2020-2023 and search keywords included usability, user experience, digital, digital health service and digital social service.
The research results showcased that similar usability factors were represented in many studies, regardless of the service's specification or type of service. Usability was found to increase when users experienced that they were offered useful services, designed for the users needs and that the services were easy to use, guiding the user and providing clear information in a simple language and preferably in different types of forms such as interactive elements or in dynamic content. Usability was found to reduce when the service provided too much information in text form, included medicalized terms, lacked sufficient user guidance and included design choices that made the service complicated and unintuitive.
This thesis combines information about usability factors from the citizen users' perspective. This knowledge is especially useful when evaluating digital services and designing them for this user segment. Good usability is a key factor in digital services no matter what industry they involve. Especially important it is in digital services that are targeted to citizens that have very heterogenic backgrounds and digital skills, and are not experts of the structures in social and healthcare and in most cases do not possess as much information in social and healthcare literacy as professionals do.