Digital health and quality of home-based primary care for older adults: A scoping review protocol

Introduction: Digital health strategies have expanded in home care, particularly in home-based primary care (HBPC) following the increase in the older adult population and the need to respond to the higher demand of chronic conditions and health frailties of this population. There was an even greater demand with COVID-19 and subsequent isolation/social distancing measures for this group considered at risk. The objective of this study is to map digital health strategies and analyze their impacts on the quality of home-based primary care for older adults around the world. Methods and analysis: This is a scoping review protocol which will enable a rigorous, transparent and reliable synthesis of knowledge. The review will be developed in the theoretical perspective of Arksey and O malley, with updates by Levac et al. and Peters et al., based on the Joanna Briggs Institute manual, and guided by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR). Data from white literature will be extracted from multidisciplinary health databases such as: the Virtual Health Library, LILACS, PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, CINAHL and Embase; while Google Scholar will be used for gray literature. The quantitative data will be analyzed through descriptive statistics and qualitative data through thematic analysis. The results will be submitted to stakeholder consultation for preliminary sharing of study findings, identification of gaps, effective dissemination strategies and suggestions for future studies. Ethics and disclosure: Stakeholder consultation was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Hospital Onofre Lopes, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, CAEE 54853921.0.0000.5292, and will not involve direct patient participation. It is registered in the Open Science Framework (OSF) (https://osf.io/vgkhy/). The results will be disseminated through publication in open access scientific journals, in scientific events and academic and community journals.