A smart-phone mobile application solution for the management of hypertension

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Mobile Telecommunication Innovation (MSc. MTI)Population health of a country is a very important aspect especially when it comes to the nation's productivity. With the increase in industrialization, lifestyle diseases are on the rise. These diseases have to be managed since individuals have to live with them in their lifetime. Hypertension has been identified as one of the major lifestyle diseases and is also one of the main causes of cardio-vascular diseases. A new integrated model that helps patients of hypertension to be able to monitor their lifestyle and manage it accordingly was designed and a mobile architecture developed. The application captures parameters important to monitor factors that cause hypertension. This information can be used by the medical practitioners to effectively monitor patients' health condition and as a result have a more informed judgment when giving a prescription. The patient in turn, is able to monitor him or herself in order to ensure compliance, with the kind of lifestyle and medication. The resulting mobile application's functionalities were tested with users, doctors and nurses. The doctors and nurses found that the parameters captured to test various factors were accurate and could be used to ensure compliance to change in lifestyle among patients. The patients found the mobile application user friendly, relevant and easy to use. This study can be used as a framework for other systems to be built upon. Mobile developers can use this application as a starting point to develop even better systems for other lifestyle diseases. Researchers may also build upon this work as a platform for improved frameworks and models