Projects

HantsPolHealth: Police Health and Wellbeing Mobile Application

HantsPolHealth: Police Health and Wellbeing Mobile Application Thumbnail

Abstract

Police officers often work long, unsocial hours in a highly pressurised environment and may experience difficulties in managing their health and well-being. Their jobs can be highly stressful and may feature unusual working hours and multiple shift patterns. When we think of the policing environment of today, many roles that were previously the domain of warranted officers are now carried out by non-warranted police staff equivalents. These police staff roles are relatively new to policing but put staff under some of the same stresses as police officers.

A research project from the Faculty of Science and Technology affirmed that the working environment for officers makes it harder for those affected to make healthy choices (Swanston, et. al., 2021). The problem not only includes thinking of a solution to help manage personalised risk issues, but also ensuring it won’t be intrusive for users during and outside of work.

Hampshire Constabulary requested help to investigate technologies that could be used to improve health and well-being and research how these technologies could be used to measure and track health behaviour change. A multi-disciplinary project team has been assembled to work on this project. Working with Dr Huseyin Dogan (Principal Investigator), Dr Festus Adedoyin and Professor Nan Jiang from the Faculty of Science and Technology, Professor Jane Murphy and Dr Andy Pulman from Faculty of Health and Social Science as well as representatives from Hampshire Constabulary.

This project has developed and launched a fully functioning application (HantsPolHealth App) monitoring the members of the force’s health and wellbeing, and this application are available in Android and iOS formats. Going forward, the App has been updated with new features covering shift patterns, financial wellbeing, good mental health, and considerations are in place for its use by other blue light forces. Additionally, longitudinal usability data will be collected with the continuous use of the App. This demonstrates potential expansion of the project and longer-term use by the funder.

The research project has been co-funded by Bournemouth University and the commissioning client.

Project Publications

  1. Swanston, E., Pulman, A., Dogan, H., Murphy, J. and Bitters, F., 2021. Scoping the need for a tailored mhealth app to improve health and well-being behavioral transformation in the police: Exploring the views of uk police workers via web-based surveys and client meetings. JMIR Formative Research, 5 (8). DOI: 2196/28075
  2. Mehra, R., Pulman, A., Dogan, H., Murphy, J. and Bitters, F., 2022. A Tailored mHealth App to Improve Health and Wellbeing Behavioral Transformation in the Police: Usability Testing via a Mixed-Methods Study Among UK Police Workers. Preprint. JMIR.
Researchers
Dr Festus Adedoyin Thumbnail
Dr Festus Adedoyin

Senior Lecturer in Computer Science

Professor Huseyin Dogan Thumbnail
Professor Huseyin Dogan

Director of the Computing and Informatics Research Centre & Professor of Human Computer Interaction