Enhancing User Experience through Optimization Design Method for Elderly Medication Reminder Mobile Applications: A QFD-Based Research Approach
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript provides valuable insights into the design considerations for creating an effective medication reminder application for the elderly based on KANO model, AHP, QFD, and PUGH decision matrix.
Thank you for the opportunity to read the manuscript and please allow me to make some recommendations:
I recommend the authors to provide a few more details of how the mapping relationships between user demands and design requirements were established. This could enhance the transparency and replicability of their research.
Are the other limitations to the study, except one mentioned - that is limited to the elderly communities in first-tier and second-tier cities in China ? It is important to acknowledge potential limitations in data collection, analysis methods, and generalizability to ensure the robustness of the findings.
I suggest that the authors could include a comparative analysis with existing medication reminder apps (perhaps test them, more than quote what others wrote about apps), to allow for a better understanding of how the proposed design requirements and solutions differ from or build upon existing approaches.
It would be interesting to see the comparative analysis, benchmarking against existing solutions, or conducting usability testing with real users, that would strengthen the study's conclusions and practical implications.
I believe that in order to validate the effectiveness of the proposed design, the manuscript should consider conducting further user testing with elderly individuals (if not in the present research, perhaps in the future). It would be beneficial to conduct the user testing or usability studies to evaluate the effectiveness and user satisfaction with the implemented design options. This could provide valuable insights into the usability, satisfaction, and potential areas for improvement of the medication reminder application.
I also suggest the authors to consider further design elements, that could enhance the user experience for elderly users. For example, the integration of personalized medication schedules, missed doses, or integration with wearable devices for monitoring their health etc.
Since the study is actual and may have a practical impact, I recommend that the authors offer some practical recommendations or guidelines for designers and developers based on the study's findings, to assist practitioners in implementing the design principles of their manuscript.
I suggest that the authors carefully re-read the manuscript, possibly even ask a native speaker, so that the manuscript would flow normally. I didn't understand from certain sentences, where they start and where they end (I see that the . dot character is sometimes placed strangely in the text). For example:
"Several studies have shown that current medication management applications are difficult for elderly users to use[2]. Kelly Anne Grindrod et al. The usability evaluation of mobile drug management applications shows that the two applications with simple interfaces are more popular among the elderly[30]; Rachel E. Stuck et al. A comprehensive evaluation of Medisafe showed that its design did not consider the needs, abilities, and limitations of the elderly. "
"The combination of QFD and PUGH methods enables decision-makers to comprehensively understand the strengths and weaknesses of each design option, mitigating subjective biases and yielding more objective evaluation results[22] The research method of "
etc.
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
TITLE
Enhancing User Experience through Optimization Design Method for Elderly Medication Reminder Mobile Applications: A QFD-Based Research Approach.
SUMMARY OF CONTRIBUTION
The paper describes a KANO-AHP-QFD-PUGH-based method to design applications for elderly medication reminder.
FINAL EVALUATION
As a first consideration, I regret to say that there should be some more respect towards the reviewers, their dedication and the time they spend in reading/evaluating the papers. A paper like this one should never have been submitted as-is. It was not even re-read before the submission. Figures, tables and headings are often wrong numbered; there are grammar errors; strange punctuation everywhere… In a word: unreadable. Apart from this, the research contribution of the paper is quite limited; to me, the results coming from 23 pages describing the development and adoption of a KANO-AHP-QFD-PUGH-based-method in enhancing the usability of healthcare apps could have been quite easily obtained by a couple of good UX experts in two hours or less. One could say: ok, but the method could be adopted in different contexts by different researchers, etc. That could be true but… the description of the method is so obscure that, e.g., I would not be able to apply it by myself. If we add a questionable paper structure (e.g., what is in the Materials and Methods Section should not be there) and scarcely meaningful results… unfortunately, I am forced to suggest to reject the paper.
In the following there are some comments that could help the authors in writing future papers.
COMMENTS
General considerations.
As said in the final evaluation Section, English is very poor. Punctuation errors are scattered here and there; there are sentences without verbs (e.g., lines 43-45), etc.
Regarding the paper structure, there are mistakes in heading numbering (e.g., Heading 2.1 appears twice), the first figure cited in the text of the paper is Figure 3 (line 187) (where are the references to figures 1 and 2?), the first table cited in the text is table 2 (line 197), etc.
3. Materials and methods.
Usually, this section contains the materials and methods used to carry on the research activities, as well as all the elements that will be of help in evaluating the quality and correctness of the results. In the paper, this section contains the description of the developed method, in other words, part of the research activities. Wrong.
The first sentence of this section (line 187) is “Our research methods consisted of 5 steps, as shown in Figure 3.” Thus… how many methods (it is plural)? Figure 3… or Figure 2? Who knows?
Figure 2… it is a mess. The label “Sustainable design optimization” appears twice. What’s this? The captions of the two arrows? The title of the figure? Who knows… The paper text explains the figure starting from the Kano Model box; what about the part to its left?
Many parts of the paper contain descriptions completely obscure. An example of this in in lines 191-197 (and the bad reference to the table al line 197 does not help).
Many parts currently present in section 3 should have been placed in the background Section. For example, the AHP description from line 212 on. Maybe the fact that the authors do not have clear in mind the role of the Section “Material and Methods” in a normal paper generated this kind of misunderstandings.
There are strange numbers here and there during the description of the method. For example, there is a ‘1’ at line 220. What is that? A reference to some element of figure 2? Where is the corresponding label ‘1’ in the figure? Again, from line 275 on, there are a ‘1’ and a ‘2’. But, looking at Figure 2, there should be also ‘3’ and ‘4’. Where are they in the text? Who knows…
Line 299 (1. Design solution generation): I was very curious about this and I was expecting real hints about the development of the design solutions starting from users’ and design requirements (rows and columns of the HoQ). But I was not lucky in finding any in the paper…
Lines 310-323: another piece of text completely obscure.
4. Results.
Results… of what? Of what is described in a Section named “Materials and methods?” Please…
Table 7 (maybe) contains the questions asked to the users. I read them and wondered… have all the pieces of information been kept into consideration? Looking at the questionnaire… to me, there are useless questions, one of the biggest errors when designing surveys.
Again, referring to the questionnaire… there is “what feature do you hate most?”. Feature? Feature of what? Another big mistake when designing surveys. The rule is: always use the users’ language and be sure that the questionnaire is self-explanatory.
Table 8 (maybe): a separator would have been required in the middle (otherwise it seems that there are just continuous lines in the table). Moreover, the voices are not uniform (and badly described in English).
The caption of Figure 4 made me jump in my chair. “Project A Interaction Interface”. Do the authors know the heavy differences among the terms Interaction, Interface… usability… UX… I start to suspect that the answer is no.
The text around table 13 does not tell the must important thing: who won? Who was the best scheme?
5. Discussion.
References in the discussion section? Why? Reference to the surgery domain… why? Who knows…
Please see the previous section
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This paper takes a quantitative perspective in analysing user requirements and applies the Kano model, AHP, QFD and PUGH methods; it should be said that this attempt is effective and this research is a guide to design related to the elderly; the visualisation of the design process is also quite important and Figure 2 is a good representation of this;It would have made more sense if the authors had paid more attention to the formatting of the tables. It is recommended that the table header should appear on every page where the table appears so that the reader can easily read it. Figure 3 should also be the table. More attention should be paid to detail (e.g. in line 517 'Table 10' should be Table 13). Attention should be paid to the use of tenses and plurals, and the use of standard words (e.g. the use of demand and need). Overall, this is a good article and its publication will bring some value to the design of products for older people.
The overall line of writing is not bad. However, attention should be paid to the use of tenses and plurals, and the use of standard words (e.g. the use of demand and need).
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
This article makes a study on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, where the elderly faced a greater
memory load when it comes to medication use. In order to help improve the medication adherence of the elderly and the usability, efficiency, and satisfaction of the medication management APP for the elderly, the said study tries to improve the design issues
of the drug management APP and proposes a possible Kano-AHP-QFD-PUGH integrated continuous optimization design method that not only solves the limitations of the
unique design method, but also make up for the shortcomings of the drug management application in the transformation of aging and improve the user experience of the
elderly.
The respective case study demonstrates how to obtain the user's needs through qualitative research and classify them in Kano attributes. Then use AHP to build a user needs hierarchy and determine each need's weight ratings. QFD method maps user needs to design requirements and uses a quality house to determine the importance of each project requirement, identifying the main needs. Finally, PUG Concept selection is used to verify the feasibility of the design scheme, and the results indicate that Project B was the best design solution. The entire design process focuses on the senior user group and uses qualitative and quantitative methods to integrate your special needs into the application design.
The results of this study have theoretical and practical significance. It provides a theoretical basis for designers to develop application design methods in the future and offers specific targeted design solutions. Thus, in this article, the study demonstrates that this research can be effectively applied to the age-appropriate transformation of medication reminder apps for seniors, and it is not only suitable for seniors but also other user groups researching sustainable user experience optimization design for apps. The article is well written and well formulated with new contributions. Therefore, the article is accepted for publication.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
I appreciate the way the authors accepted and followed my remarks and suggestions.
