A Feasibility Study of a Mobile Application Intervention to Promote Strength and Balance Exercises in Older People

This five arm feasibility study aims to promote self-management in strength and balance exercises among community-living older people. The research process, implementation strategies and procedures, acceptability of the exercise programs, perceived benefits of the programs, and the ecological validity, acceptability and ability to detect change of possible outcome measurements will be evaluated before a future randomized controlled trial. A comparison of two exercise programs will be performed; a) Safe Step, a mobile technology based exercise program with motivational strategies, developed by researchers in collaboration with older adults, and b) Otago Exercise Program (OEP), home exercises presented in a booklet. The older participants will be free to select either of the intervention programs and the selection process and outcome will be studied as part of the process evaluation.

The participants in three of the arms (OEP, Safe Step, and Safe Step with mentors) will be recruited through advertisements in local papers and through posters and meetings at senior citizens organisations. In the fourth and fifth arms (OEP and Safe Step) the participants will be recruited from health care centres and their registered professionals with experience of greens prescriptions (Fysisk aktivitet på recept). All five groups, with at least 10 participants in each, will be exercising for four months and will undergo testing at baseline, after two and four months and they will be asked to keep an exercise diary (digital or paper format) during the intervention.