Usability of a mobile application for the clinical follow-up of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and home oxygen therapy

•Patients with chronic diseases develop self-management and care skills via e-Health.•Lack of a review before marketing impacts adherence to use of e-Health.•Conducting research via design methodology focused on the final users is important.•Developing app architecture and content via user-focused methods can determine that this strategy improves performance and generates positive results in user tests. Technological health tools (e-Health) may potentially facilitate the treatment of patients with chronic diseases through development of self-management and -care skills in patients and caregivers. However, these tools are usually marketed without prior analysis and without providing any context to final users, which frequently results in low adherence to their use. To determine the usability of and satisfaction toward a mobile app for the clinical monitoring of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) receiving oxygen therapy at home. This was a participative-qualitative study focused on final users—with direct intervention by patients and professionals—consisting of three phases as follows: (i) medium-fidelity mockups design, (ii) development of a usability test for each user profile, and (iii) assessment of the satisfaction level regarding the usability of the mobile app. A sample was established and selected through non-probability convenience sampling and was divided into two groups as follows: healthcare professionals (n = 13) and patients (n = 7). Each participant received a smartphone with mockup designs. The “think-aloud” method was applied in the usability test. Participants were audio recorded and the anonymous transcriptions were analyzed, highlighting fragments about mockups characteristics and the usability test. The difficulty level of the tasks was assessed with a scale from 1 (very easy) to 5 (too difficult), and task non-completion was considered a critical mistake. The satisfaction level related to test usability was assessed with a 4-score Likert scale ranging from 4 (totally agree) to 1 (totally disagree). Regarding the difficulty level, >60% of professionals described most tasks as “very easy” and 70% of patients as “easy.” No participant made critical mistakes and both groups reported a high satisfaction level regarding the usability variables. The patient and professionals group required 18 and 11 min to complete all tasks, respectively. Participants described the app as intuitive and easy to use. The usability satis