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Despite the rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in professional environments, its implications for employee engagement are notyet well understood. Hence, this study examines how AI technologies impact employee engagement in the IT sector. The study consistedof 28 semi-structured interviews with IT professionals, recruited in Sweden. The responses were recorded, transcribed, and thematicallyanalyzed using the job demands-resource framework. The findings reveal that AI can enhance work engagement by reducing repetitivetasks, supporting learning, and increasing the meaningfulness of work. However, AI also introduces new demands, including cognitiveoverload, skill relevance uncertainty, and concerns about tool reliability and leadership support. Theoretically, the findings highlight theneed to adapt the Job Demands Resources model to account for the dynamic, context-dependent nature of digital technologies, suchas AI. This suggests the emergence of a concept we term Digital Work Engagement, a positive and fulfilling user experience of vigor,dedication, and absorption based on the worker’s interactions with and relation to technology in the workplace. Practically, the studyoffers guidance for designers and managers on fostering work engagement by aligning AI development and integration with professionalgrowth, autonomy, and support.

Digital health interventions frequently struggle to sustain engagement over time, particularly when users are under stress and have limited time. This challenge is highly visible in informal caregiving for individuals with cancer. Informal caregivers must quickly assume complex practical responsibilities while managing uncertainty, emotional distress, and changing family roles. Many also report feeling excluded from care processes and lacking timely guidance from healthcare professionals. In such a context, engagement cannot be understood as a simple usage metric. It is closely linked to whether a digital tool fits into everyday life, provides meaningful support, and strengthens the caregiver's sense of competence and connection. If the intervention does not align with lived realities, even well-designed systems risk limited uptake and short-term use.

The Carer eSupport project aimed to develop and evaluate a web-based application to strengthen informal caregivers' preparedness for caregiving and support their well-being [2]. The intervention was developed through a human-centred design process that actively involved caregivers and healthcare professionals. The design focused on providing reliable information, practical guidance, psychosocial resources, and opportunities to connect both with peers and with healthcare professionals. From the outset, our goal was not to optimise engagement as a primary outcome. Instead, we sought to design content and features that would feel meaningful, relevant, and supportive in caregivers' everyday lives. The theoretical foundation drew on perspectives of well-being, particularly eudaimonic aspects such as competence, autonomy, and a sense of purpose. We aimed to create a resource that caregivers could turn to when they needed it, rather than a platform that required constant attention or ongoing interaction. However, during the feasibility study and pilot testing, it became clear that the intervention's potential impact depended strongly on how, and whether, caregivers engaged with it. Engagement was shaped not only by usability, but also by emotional readiness, perceived relevance, trust in the healthcare system, and the time and energy caregivers had available. In this setting, engagement could not be reduced to interaction metrics. It was closely connected to caregivers' lived experiences and the practical and emotional demands they faced each day.

Background:

Video consultations (VCs) are effective and beneficial, yet their use is being discontinued, and there is a preference for face-to-face consultations.

Objective:

This study investigates how patients and health care professionals (HCPs) perceive patients’ introduction to VCs, who use them, and what drives their use in Swedish primary care.

Methods:

Six focus group interviews with 27 HCPs and 13 individual interviews with patients in primary care were conducted between August 2022 and May 2023. The interviews examined VC implementation and were analyzed using rapid assessment procedures.

Results:

A total of five themes were identified: (1) challenging start with unprepared users and immature technology; (2) users and nonusers are perceived to have different characteristics, needs, and circumstances; (3) patient-related drivers: based on patients’ preferences and opportunities; (4) HCP-related drivers: clinical suitability, assessment of patient needs, and preferences; and (5) societal and organizational drivers: the pandemic, demographics, and infrastructure. Patients and HCPs described the introduction of VCs as rushed and confusing, with limited guidance and support (theme 1). HCPs struggled to assist patients due to a lack of training and limited access to the patient-facing interface (theme 1). VC users were typically perceived as younger, digitally literate, and motivated by convenience or urgency, while older adults and those with language or cognitive barriers were often assumed to be nonusers (theme 2). VC use was shaped by patient preferences, accessibility, and clinical urgency (theme 3), as well as by HCPs’ professional judgment and convenience (theme 4). Assumptions held by HCPs about patients’ digital skills and preferences influenced whether VCs were offered, while patients’ own assumptions about complexity or suitability affected whether they accepted them. Broader factors, such as digital infrastructure, platform usability, reimbursement policies, and the COVID-19 pandemic, also significantly influenced use (theme 5).

Conclusions:

The rushed implementation potentially deterred some patients and HCPs from use. Misguided preconceptions and biases negatively influenced VC use and risked reinforcing existing disparities and contributing to digital exclusion. In addition, HCPs’ and patients’ preferences, which were related to their needs, waiting times, and different circumstances, and potentially misguided judgments of appropriateness, influenced VC use. Lastly, infrastructure, reimbursement, sociodemographics, and organizational type also drive VC use. To support more sustainable and equitable use of VC in primary care, developers should optimize VC applications’ usability, implementers should deploy multiple strategies, health care providers should consider the potential of VC in care delivery, and policymakers should increase digital readiness. Further research should evaluate the effectiveness of different strategies for introducing patients to VCs, explore younger patients’ and nonusers’ perspectives, characteristics of HCP users, and differences between professional roles, as well as between consultation types.

BACKGROUND: Quality in use (QiU), a stakeholder-centered dimension of software quality encompassing effectiveness, efficiency, satisfaction, and freedom from risk, is essential in evaluating digital systems, particularly in health-related domains. Although QiU has been explored in various fields, its application within connected mental health (CMH) systems remains fragmented and understudied. Given the rapid rise in CMH technologies, ranging from mobile apps to teletherapy platforms, understanding how QiU is conceptualized, evaluated, and reported in this domain has become increasingly urgent.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to systematically map and synthesize existing research on QiU in CMH applications. It seeks to identify current trends, research gaps, evaluation methods, and the range of technologies examined concerning QiU.

METHODS: A systematic mapping methodology following the guidelines by Petersen et al will be used. The process includes defining mapping questions, developing a classification scheme, and systematically searching and analyzing peer-reviewed literature from databases-Scopus, PubMed, IEEE Xplore, and ACM Digital Library. Eight mapping questions will guide the analysis, focusing on publication trends, research types, empirical evaluations, QiU characteristics and subcharacteristics, and technologies studied.

RESULTS: As this paper presents the protocol for an ongoing mapping study, results are not yet available. The literature search and data analysis are scheduled for completion in 2026. Preliminary screening suggests variability in how QiU is defined and evaluated across CMH technologies, highlighting the need for systematic synthesis.

CONCLUSIONS: This systematic mapping study will fill a critical gap by providing a comprehensive overview of QiU research in the context of CMH. By organizing and classifying the existing literature, the study will inform future research, support the development of more user-centered CMH tools, and contribute to establishing more consistent evaluation practices in this growing field.

INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/79611.

Background: Informal caregivers (ICs), often family members or close friends, provide essential support to individuals with head and neck cancer. However, they are frequently unprepared for the emotional, practical, and medical challenges involved. Web-based applications offer promising opportunities to support ICs, but their long-term adoption and acceptance remain uncertain.

Objective: This paper presents the development of Carer eSupport, a web-based application to support ICs’ well-being and preparedness for caregiving. We detail the design and functionality of the Carer eSupport application and explain how it responds to both the functional and psychological needs of ICs. Additionally, we report findings from the pilot study and highlight the initial challenges ICs faced when engaging with the application, along with the strategies used to overcome them.

Methods: The study involved a multicenter research trial across ear, nose, and throat clinics and oncology and radiotherapy clinics at 4 university hospitals in Sweden. The application was developed through 3 human-centered design (HCD) iterations involving ICs, health care professionals, and researchers in human-computer interaction and cancer care.

Results: The results present an overview of the current version of Carer eSupport (developed during the third design iteration), with a focus on features that address the psychological needs of ICs, including competence, autonomy, and a sense of connection to others. The pilot study achieved a 66.7% (20/30) consent rate, a 75% (9/12) successful login rate among participants, and a 13.3% (4/30) attrition rate, meeting the established criteria. The pilot study confirmed the application’s readiness for further evaluation in an ongoing randomized controlled trial. It also identified challenges, including the time constraints of ICs, login and authentication issues, limited IT infrastructure, and gaps in digital literacy.

Conclusions: Findings from the HCD process and pilot study indicate that a personalized, interactive application like Carer eSupport can provide meaningful support for ICs of individuals with head and neck cancer. The integration of HCD and health care science offers early guidance for developing digital tools that are both evidence-based and empathetic, with potential relevance beyond caregiving contexts.

Background: Patients’ access to their electronic health record (EHR) supports their participation and satisfaction with care. Despite the benefits, some patients have been upset after reading their EHR. Additionally, health care professionals are concerned that patients, particularly those with mental health conditions, may be offended, and they have expressed a need for further guidelines on how to write EHRs. Experiences among various patient groups are essential to support the relationship between patients and professionals. However, prior studies have often focused on single patient groups or specific clinical contexts, leaving a limited understanding of differences across multiple patient groups. Objective: This study aimed to determine whether certain patient groups are more likely to feel offended while reading their EHRs and which information is perceived as offensive and to provide a comparison across multiple patient groups using a mixed methods approach. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted via the Finnish national patient portal using a web-based patient survey, adopting a mixed methods approach. The survey included multiple-choice and open-ended questions. The total sample comprised 4681 respondents. The survey respondents were placed into 4 patient groups: those who had received care for mental health, cancer, or other conditions and those who had received no care. Associations between the type of care and patients who felt offended were estimated using multivariate binary logistic regression. Inductive content analysis (n=502) was conducted to identify information perceived as offensive in the EHR. Results: The patients who had received mental health care (166/654, 25.4%) or cancer and mental health care (9/39, 23.1%) were more likely to be offended by information in their EHR compared to the other groups (cancer care: 37/375, 9.9%; other conditions care: 383/3316, 11.6%; no care: 22/206, 10.7%; other conditions care: odds ratio 0.37, 95% CI 0.29‐0.46; P<.001; model A). Additionally, female patients, those with bad or very bad health conditions, and patients with bachelor’s or master’s degrees were significantly more likely to feel offended. Errors, the health care professionals’ disrespectful language, and perceived unnecessary information were the most frequently mentioned reasons for being offended. Patients with mental health care reported more often that unnecessary information and professionals’ opinions and word choices were experienced as offensive compared to other patients. Conclusions: This study contributes new knowledge by identifying differences across multiple patient groups. Although a minority of patients felt offended by their EHR, health care professionals should consider that some patients, particularly those who have received mental health care or cancer and mental health care, may be offended by specific information or word choices in their EHRs. To address this, health care professionals should receive education on how to write their notes in a neutral tone and avoid potentially offensive topics. Improving the quality of EHRs could strengthen the relationship between patients and professionals.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping work, presenting new challenges and opportunities for professionals across industries. This study, grounded in Self-Determination Theory (SDT), examines the impact of AI integration on work engagement among IT professionals. Through qualitative investigation, our research reveals that AI both augments and complicates professionals' work lives, providing opportunities for growth while also demanding ongoing adaptation. Key findings indicate that AI tools like UiPath and GitHub Copilot enhance work efficiency by automating routine tasks, enabling professionals to concentrate on more complex aspects of their work and enhancing their perceived competence. However, this efficiency gain requires continuous learning and adaptation, posing challenges in maintaining engagement and mastery. These findings illuminate the complex balance between leveraging AI for increased efficiency and maintaining the intrinsic human elements of IT design, offering some insights for navigating AI integration in the workplace.

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues transforming workplaces globally, particularly within the Information Technology (IT) industry, understanding its impact on IT professionals and computing curricula is crucial. This research builds on joint work from two countries, addressing concerns about AI's increasing influence in IT sector workplaces and its implications for tertiary education. The study focuses on AI technologies such as generative AI (GenAI) and large language models (LLMs). It examines how they are perceived and adopted and their effects on workplace dynamics, task allocation, and human-system interaction.

IT professionals, noted as early adopters of AI, offer valuable insights into the interplay between AI and work engagement, highlighting the significant competencies required for digital workplaces. This study employs a dual-method approach, combining a systematic and multi-vocal literature review and qualitative research methods. These included a thematic analysis of a set of 47 interviews conducted between March and May of 2024 with IT professionals in two countries (New Zealand and Sweden). The research aimed to understand the implications for computing students, education curricula, and the assessment of emerging professional competencies.

The literature review found insufficient evidence addressing comprehensive AI practice methodologies, highlighting the need to both develop and regulate professional competencies for effective AI integration. Key interview findings revealed diverse levels of GenAI adoption, ranging from individual experimentation to institutional integration. Participants generally expressed positive attitudes toward the technology and were actively pursuing self-learning despite some concerns. The themes emerging from the interviews included AI's role in augmenting human tasks, privacy and security concerns, productivity enhancements, legal and ethical challenges, and the evolving need for new competencies in the workplace.

The study underscores the critical role of competency frameworks in guiding professional development and ensuring preparedness for an AI-driven environment. Additionally, it highlights the need for educational institutions to adapt curricula to address these emerging demands effectively.

Background

Informal caregivers (ICs) of individuals with head and neck cancer (HNC) often face heavy responsibilities with little preparation or support. Web-based health applications might be beneficial in this context, but their acceptance and influence on ICs' well-being require further investigation.

Objective

This study examines the acceptance and use of a web-based application designed to improve ICs' preparedness for caregiving and support their well-being. It also extends the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) with eudaimonic motivation, defined as the drive for personal growth, purpose, and self-actualisation, to explore how the application may enhance ICs’ well-being.

Methods

A multicentre feasibility study was carried out at ear, nose, and throat, oncology, and radiotherapy clinics across four Swedish university hospitals. Nineteen ICs took part in semi-structured interviews after five weeks of using Carer eSupport. Data were analysed through deductive thematic analysis guided by the extended UTAUT model.

Results

ICs perceived Carer eSupport as relevant and helpful in strengthening competence and preparedness. Barriers included information overload, lack of personalisation, and usability challenges. Participants recommended adding online forums, meetings with healthcare professionals, psychological support, and a more aesthetically improved layout.

Conclusion

Web-based applications have the potential to improve ICs’ preparedness and well-being if barriers to acceptance and use are addressed. Extending UTAUT with eudaimonic motivation provided new insights into how such applications can meet ICs’ intrinsic needs and support acceptance. This feasibility study lays the foundation for a forthcoming randomised controlled trial to evaluate the effectiveness of the application.