Digital health communication strategies to support a healthy lifestyle in adults with chronic diseases who have possible limited health literacy: a scoping review

Background and problem statement Not all non-communicable (NCDs) diseases are preventable, but a healthy lifestyle certainly lowers the risk of serious illness or premature death (WHO 1999). Various efforts have been launched to improve people’s lifestyles. The WHO has been leading several initiatives to assist communities to live a healthy lifestyle. These include the WHO Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity and Health (2004), endorsing recommendations on marketing of foods (2010), the Comprehensive Implementation Plan on Maternal, Infant and Young Child Nutrition (2014) and setting global voluntary targets to prevent and control NCDs. The United Nations also came onboard with the Rome Declaration on Nutrition (2014), which recommended a set of policies/strategies promoting healthy diets across the lifespan. The WHO’s focus on healthy lifestyle centers on recommendations including “eating lots of fruits and vegetables, reducing fat, sugar and salt intake and exercising” (WHO, 2010). In order to increase healthy lifestyles, these messages have to be communicated worldwide. mHealth has been recognized as a strategy to increase health access, more so in resource limited areas (WHO, 2016). The challenge faced by researchers is to synthesize existing mHealth communication strategies supporting a healthy lifestyle in adults with chronic diseases. Conceptual clarity is needed to distinguish between the vast and possible diverse contexts where mHealth communication strategies are used in resource limited and resource rich settings. A systematic approach is therefore indicated to identify research gaps in existing literature within the field of supporting healthy lifestyles in adults with chronic diseases who have possible limited health literacy. Purpose The purpose of the research is to identify research gaps in existing literature concerning digital health communication strategies to support a healthy lifestyle in adults with chronic diseases who have possible limited health literacy, in order to compile a framework informing research in this specific field.