ReviewDigital health
Systematic review of cost-effectiveness analysis of behavior change communication apps: Assessment of key methods.
Review in Digital health. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Challenges and Limitations in Distributional Cost-Effectiveness Analysis: A Systematic Literature Review.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Pooled it
- An Overview on Methods, Evidence, and Study Quality of Health Economic Evaluation Studies for Independently Usable Digital Health Apps: Rapid Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Review
- Economic Evaluation of Robotic-assisted Radical Prostatectomy: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.European urology open science · 2025Review
- Developing a Program Costs Checklist of Digital Health Interventions: A Scoping Review and Empirical Case Study.PharmacoEconomics · 2024Article
- Assessing the Quality and Impact of eHealth Tools: Systematic Literature Review and Narrative Synthesis.JMIR human factors · 2023Review
- The Influence of a Wearable-Based Reward Program on Health Care Costs: Retrospective, Propensity Score-Matched Cohort Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Observational
- Cost-effectiveness of a direct to beneficiary mobile communication programme in improving reproductive and child health outcomes in India.BMJ global health · 2023Article
- Recommendations for developing a lifecycle, multidimensional assessment framework for mobile medical apps.Health economics · 2022Article
- Measuring Mobile Phone Application Usability for Anticoagulation from the Perspective of Patients, Caregivers, and Healthcare Professionals.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Methods and Lessons From Costing a Large mHealth Intervention at Scale in India.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveEvidence backing the effectiveness of mobile health technology is growing, and behavior change communication applications (apps) are fast becoming a useful platform for behavioral health programs. However, data to support the cost-effectiveness of these interventions are limited. Suggestions for overcoming the low output of economic data include addressing the methodological challenges for conducting cost-effectiveness analysis of behavior change app programs. This study is a systematic review of cost-effectiveness analyses of behavior change communication apps and a documentation of the reported challenges for investigating their cost-effectiveness. MATERIALS AND
methodsFour academic databases: Medline (Ovid), CINAHL, EMBASE and Google Scholar, were searched. Eligibility criteria included original articles that use a cost-effectiveness evaluation method, published between 2008 and 2018, and in the English language.
resultsOut of the 60 potentially eligible studies, 6 used cost-effectiveness analysis method and met the inclusion criteria.
conclusionThe evidence to support the cost-effectiveness of behavior change communication apps is insufficient, with all studies reporting significant study challenges for estimating program costs and outcomes. The main challenges included limited or lack of cost data, inappropriate cost measures, difficulty with identifying and quantifying app effectiveness, representing app effects as Quality-adjusted Life Years, and aggregating cost and effects into a single quantitative measure like Incremental Cost Effectiveness Ratio. These challenges highlight the need for comprehensive economic evaluation methods that balance app data quality issues with practical concerns. This would likely improve the usefulness of cost-effectiveness data for decisions on adoption, implementation, scalability, sustainability, and the benefits of broader healthcare investments.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.