ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a transformative force across the health sector and has garnered significant attention within sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) due to polarizing views on its opportunities to advance care and the heightened risks and implications it brings to people's well-being and bodily autonomy. As the fields of AI and SRHR evolve, clarity is needed to bridge our understanding of how AI is being used within this historically politicized health area and raise visibility on the critical issues that can facilitate its responsible and meaningful use. OBJECTIVE: This paper presents the protocol for a scoping review to synthesize empirical studies that focus on the intersection of AI and SRHR. The review aims to identify the characteristics of AI systems and tools applied within SRHR, regarding health domains, intended purpose, target users, AI data life cycle, and evidence on benefits and harms. METHODS: The scoping review follows the standard methodology developed by Arksey and O'Malley. We will search the following electronic databases: MEDLINE (PubMed), Scopus, Web of Science, and CINAHL. Inclusion criteria comprise the use of AI systems and tools in sexual and reproductive health and clear methodology describing either quantitative or qualitative approaches, including program descriptions. Studies will be excluded if they focus entirely on digital interventions that do not explicitly use AI systems and tools, are about robotics or nonhuman subjects, or are commentaries. We will not exclude articles based on geographic location, language, or publication date. The study will present the uses of AI across sexual and reproductive health domains, the intended purpose of the AI system and tools, and maturity within the AI life cycle. Outcome measures will be reported on the effect, accuracy, acceptability, resource use, and feasibility of studies that have deployed and evaluated AI systems and tools. Ethical and legal considerations, as well as findings from qualitative studies, will be synthesized through a narrative thematic analysis. We will use the PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews) format for the publication of the findings. RESULTS: The database searches resulted in 12,793 records when the searches were conducted in October 2023. Screening is underway, and the analysis is expected to be completed by July 2024. CONCLUSIONS: The findings will provide key insights on usage patterns and evidence on the use of AI in SRHR, as well as convey key ethical, safety, and legal considerations. The outcomes of this scoping review are contributing to a technical brief developed by the World Health Organization and will guide future research and practice in this highly charged area of work. TRIAL REGISTRATION: OSF Registries osf.io/ma4d9; https://osf.io/ma4d9. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): PRR1-10.2196/53888.
ABSTRACT
A country's digital health maturity is a key factor in the digital transformation of a national health system. Although many maturity assessment models exist in the literature, they perform as stand-alone tools without a clear indication to inform a country's strategy implementation in digital health. This study explores the dynamics between maturity assessments and strategy implementation in digital health. First, it analyses the word token distribution of key concepts in indicators from five pre-existing digital health maturity assessment models and those originated from the WHO's Global Strategy on Digital Health. Second, it compares type and token distributions in the selected topics mapped against the policy actions under the GSDH. The findings reveal existing maturity models with a significantly heavier focus on health information systems and highlight gaps in measuring and contextualising topics e.g., equity, inclusion, and digital frontiers.
