Monitoring Fatigue with Mobile Phone Application- a Feasibility Study

Background: Fatigue is rated as one of the most common and disabling symptoms in adults with multiple sclerosis (MS). Further, fatigue is subjective and occurs at different times of day in and across patients groups (Kale, Agaoglu & Tanik, 2010; Motl, McAuley, Snook, & Gliottoni; 2010). Therefore, prompt management for fatigue is still needed, and the efficacy of this management must be demonstrated with improved fatigue scores and medication adherence. 

Objectives: Objectives: To investigate the feasibility of smartphone-based data collection for fatigue onset, medication adherence, and site injection pain in pwMS who were also prescribed glatiramer acetate (GA). 

Methods: Method: A convenience sample of 14 adults with MS used web-based surveys to report fatigue, medication adherence, and site injection pain daily for 7 consecutive days, at baseline and 30 days later. 

Results: The majority of the participants were those with relapsing-remitting MS (90%), with mean SR-EDSS score of 3.5, and taking GA three times a week. All completed both the baseline and 30 day survey. 

Conclusions: The use of the developed mobile phone application may be an easy and inexpensive way to monitor and identify early signs of emerging onset of fatigue and could be used as method to improve patient-centered care for adults with MS. Our initial pilot testing supports the feasibility of the fatigue application.