Drs. Alexandra Psihogios and Colleen Stiles-Shields are guest editing a Special Issue for the Journal of Pediatric Psychology

Drs. Alexandra Psihogios and Colleen Stiles-Shields are guest editing a Special Issue for the Journal of Pediatric Psychology: Improving Digital Health Implementation in Pediatric Populations: From Design to Sustainment

Improving Digital Health Implementation in Pediatric Populations: From Design to Sustainment

Guest Editors: Alexandra Psihogios, Ph.D. & Colleen Stiles-Shields, Ph.D.

Implementation science is a broad field focused on promoting the uptake, fidelity, reach, and sustainment of evidence-based practices (i.e., the “things” that clinicians, clinics, and health systems do to promote health). Designing for implementation means that implementation is considered throughout the process of creating, testing, and sustaining a new digital tool. At the point of design, this can include creating and optimizing digital health tools in collaboration with all intended users (e.g., patients, caregivers, clinicians, and/or community members) and settings where the tool will be used (e.g., primary care, subspecialty clinics, and/or community health agencies). Implementation also involves identifying and measuring things that are useful to get people to use a digital tool (i.e., implementation strategies). If conducted thoughtfully, designing for implementation also has implications for promoting health equity. This is because the voices of pediatric patients and their families are amplified throughout the digital health pipeline, and these methods can increase access to helpful tools in their intended settings.

The aim of this special issue is to highlight digital health implementation research in pediatric psychology. By digital health, we mean digital tools that patients (or their caregivers) use for assessment or intervention (e.g., apps, text messaging, wearables), or digital strategies that clinicians use to promote evidence-based care (e.g., tracking and connecting through the electronic health records). To date, digital health special issues in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology (2009, 2019) have been largely focused on pilot and efficacy trials. Further, these special issues were situated prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and were therefore published at a time when the vast majority of SPP membership was not engaged in digital health research or use in clinical practice. By designing for implementation, pediatric psychologists are poised to address two core challenges to successful digital health implementation: suboptimal user engagement and limited reach.

Thus, we highly encourage manuscripts across the digital health pipeline– from design to sustainment–that showcase: 

Early phase studies that employ human-centered design methodologies to establish empathy with users and/or implementation settings to understand their needs, behaviors, environments, and constraints with a digital tool. For example, mixed method investigations that include co-design sessions with users and usability testing to promote the likelihood of later implementation success.

Investigations of barriers and facilitators (“determinants”) of successful digital health implementation. This may include analysis of patterns and predictors of digital health engagement and/or qualitative or mixed methods evaluation of the acceptability of a digital health tool including with users who directly use the tool and/or with the clinicians, clinics, and/or health systems that are implementing the tool.

The development or testing (via hybrid or implementation trials) of implementation strategies for promoting the uptake, fidelity, reach, and sustainment of digital health tools with pediatric populations in clinical or community settings (e.g., integration of digital patient-reported outcomes into the electronic health record, implementation of health campaigns via social media).

As part of this special issue, we would welcome relevant original research papers, as well as systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Papers should be prepared in compliance with JPP’s Instructions to Authors (http://jpepsy.oxfordjournals.org/) and submitted through the ScholarOne Manuscript Central™ submission portal (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jpepsy). Manuscripts will be peer reviewed. Papers that are not appropriate for inclusion in this special issue may be rerouted (with the authors’ knowledge and consent) for consideration for publication in JPP as regular papers. Please indicate in the cover letter accompanying your manuscript that you would like to have the paper considered for the Special Issue on Improving Digital Health Implementation in Pediatric Populations: From Design to Sustainment.

Submissions for this special issue will be accepted until December 1, 2023. 

Please direct all inquiries to Alexandra (Alex) Psihogios at alex [dot] psihogiosnorthwestern [dot] edu