An mHealth App for Users with Dexterity Impairments: Accessibility Study (Preprint)

Abstract

Background: A mobile health system called iMHere (interactive Mobile Health and Rehabilitation) was developed to support individuals with chronic conditions and disability in their self-management regimens. The initial design of iMHere, however, lacked sufficient accessibility for users with a myriad of dexterity impairments. The accessibility of self-management apps is essential in ensuring usability. Objective: This study aims to increase the usability of the iMHere system for users with dexterity impairments by increasing the app's accessibility. Methods: We targeted accessibility redesign by focusing on the physical presentation and the navigability of the iMHere apps. Six participants presenting with dexterity impairments were included in the usability study of the original and redesigned apps. Results: We report a trend toward a lower number of touches needed to complete tasks (p=0.088) and time to complete individual tasks (p=0.057) in the redesigned app compared to the original app. Significantly lower time for users to complete all tasks (p=0.006) and significantly lower error rate (p=0.013) was seen with use of the redesigned app compared to the original app. In fact, no errors occurred with use of the redesigned app. Participant-reported overall average usability of the redesigned app (p=0.007) and usability of individual modules (p<0.001) were significantly higher than that of the original app due mostly to better ease of use and learnability, interface quality, and reliability. Conclusion: Improved usability was achieved with the use of a redesigned app. This study offers insight regarding the importance of personalization in enhancing accessibility and also identifies strategies for improving usability in app development.

Percolative nature of the direct-current paraconductivity in cuprate superconductors

“…The superconducting response clearly exhibits exponential-like temperature dependence away from T c , consistent with prior magnetization [6], nonlinear response [7], and microwave conductivity [5] results. We emphasize four crucial points: (i) the observed exponential dependence is qualitatively different from the underlying normal-state power-law behavior and hence a very robust result; (ii) the agreement with other experiments, some of which require no background subtraction [6,7], provides additional justification for the validity of our approach to subtract the Fermi-liquid normal state contribution; (iii) the signal-to-noise ratio of the present data is very high, which enables us to follow the paraconductivity over more than four orders of magnitude; (iv) both the exponential temperature dependence and the fact that the characteristic temperature is distinct from T c are incompatible with standard models of superconducting fluctuations, such as Ginzburg-Landau theory [39].…”

“…In the entire temperature range where it is discernable, the paraconductivity is quantitatively explained by a simple superconducting percolation model, which implies that underlying gap disorder dominates the emergence of superconductivity.The nature of the metallic normal state and of the emergence of superconductivity in the cuprates belong to the most extensively debated problems in condensed matter physics [1]. At temperatures above the macroscopic superconducting transition temperature T c , there exists no long-range coherence, yet traces of superconductivity remain observable, and different experimental investigations have led to widely disparate conclusions [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. In contrast to prevailing thought, it was recently proposed that the normal state of underdoped cuprates exhibits Fermi-liquid charge transport [15][16][17][18], and that superconductivity emerges from this state in a percolative manner [7].…”

“…Several schemes to systematically subtract the presumed normal-state contribution have been devised, mainly based on the suppression of superconductivity with external magnetic fields [3,5,14]. However, so far only two experimental techniques can claim to be genuinely sensitive only to superconducting signals: nonlinear torque magnetization [6] and nonlinear conductivity [7].…”

“…A number of recent experimental investigations consistently point to a simple picture for both the normal state [15][16][17][18] and the superconducting emergence regime [3,4,6,7]. Measurements of transport properties, such as the dc resistivity [17], Hall angle [15] magnetoresistivity [16], and optical experiments [18], clearly show that the mobile charge carriers behave as a Fermi liquid, even in strongly underdoped compounds.…”

“…The dual observations that the magnetoresistivity obeys Kohler scaling with a 1/τ ∝ T 2 scattering rate [16] and that the optical scattering rate exhibits conventional scaling with temperature and frequency [18] are particularly clear-cut signatures of Fermi-liquid transport. Moreover, magnetization [6], highfrequency linear conductivity [3][4][5] and nonlinear response measurements [7] indicate that the superconducting emergence regime is limited to a rather narrow temperature range above T c and, importantly, that it can be described with a simple percolation model [7].…”