Methods and tools used in the Italian pilot

Phases of the pilot and co-creation tools

Stakeholder Map and Consulting Committee definition

Stakeholder mapping was conducted using an iterative method. Initially, a first list of stakeholders, decision makers and beneficiaries of the pilot project was identified and, through subsequent meetings the Consulting Committee was defined..

Interviews with health professionals of the LHA of Reggio Emilia

Interviews with health professionals provided insight for the evolution of the BMInforma project (a multilevel and multi-target program for prevention and management of childhood obesity implemented in the Province of Reggio Emilia) and the co-creation of the App.

Focus Groups

The topics that emerged from the parent and pediatrician focus groups had more to do with the use of ICT, and particularly of Apps, during their daily activities. What are the needs of IT in the daily life of parents? How is it possible to integrate the app in the work routine of pediatricians?

Public Co-creation Lab

During a national Festival on digital innovation that took place in Reggio Emilia on October 20, 2018 (during the needs assessment phase of the pilot study), a co-creation laboratory involving families and professionals called “What do you need on your smartphone for your child’s health?” was organised. In a family-friendly environment (with organised entertainment for the children), parents had the opportunity to sit down at any one of four tables – on “diet”, “physical activity”, “communication with family pediatricians”, or the “relationship with municipal institutions” – and talk with experts and decision-makers about that topic. The contents of conversations with parents were then summarized by the participant experts. There were also other ways to provide input: four signage totems indicating each of the four topics were placed around the space, and parents were invited to leave messages, insights, and comments on Post-it Notes. Also, two tablets were placed in the quietest corners of the room for anyone wanting to leave a video and/or audio message. Last, there were whiteboards available to the children and adults for drawing. To support family participation, “Pause Association” and the “Reggio Children’s Foundation” organized an atelier dedicated to food and tastes in which children could explore vegetables with all five senses. All Post-it Notes, notes from the topic table conversations, and videos were then given to the Consulting Committee in order to be discussed and analysed.

Community Reporting

Community Reporting uses digital tools to gather, curate, and mobilize lived experience stories and we implemented it in our pilot to better understand the needs of families in terms of what keeps them well.

New community reporters in our setting were trained and they gathered insight stories that were subsequently analysed using the Institute of Community Reporters’ analysis model, which examines each story in terms of topic, content, and contextual levels before inductively determining the findings across the stories.

A conversation of change activity was run, using findings and extracts from the stories gathered, as part of a Consulting Committee workshop. Stories and findings were used as stimuli for co-creative conversation about what keeps families well.

Interesting results emerged on what families deemed to be important for their well-being as being active in a variety of ways, often involving play and being outdoors, having time to spend with the family and to socialize. Interesting a story on a young girl’s use of a step-counting bracelet revealed how there can be unintended negative consequences of health (and technological) interventions.

Living Lab

The Living lab process developed in Reggio Emilia has guided to exploit potential resources available at local level: improve the relationships within wider parts of the pediatric health system from the perspective of the different stakeholders (civil organisations, associations, municipalities, domain experts). Through COSMOS toll we re-designed the results of the pilot and the change relationships among stakeholders from the initial conversations to this final stage.

Thanks to the elements emerged in the phases of co-design and implementation of the App, we have been able to plan the next steps of co-delivering and co-assessment of the entire obesity prevention program, not just of the app.

OPEN DATA, SOCIAL MEDIA AND DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES

The Italian pilot is dedicated to co-designing and implementing a digital solution, an App for the promotion of healthy lifestyle. The Consulting Committee was also able to identify its name: BeBa – Benessere Bambini (“Child well-being”).

Among the various participants in the Consulting Committee, the Municipality of Reggio Emilia plays an important role for the identification of open data sources that can be generated from the deployment of the pilot. To achieve this purpose the local pilot partners met the IT Officer at the Municipality who is responsible for the Open Data Portal. We have discussed both the possibility to use an already existing dataset available in the municipality Portal and to populate the App BeBa and, on the other side, we have talked about the chance to deliver some aggregated data generated by the App after its diffusion to the larger audience.

Different kinds of data have been particularly produced in the “needs assessment phase” and in the “planning phase” while feedback left by users who have tested the App has been collected and comments were summarized and have been considered during the development of the App.
The App has required a lot of data coming from different sources according to the different functionalities it is realizing. It can benefit from open dataset available within the Municipality portal and related to the environment (ex. parks, cyclo maps/routes) and to the population (ex. events, health promotion initiatives etc.) and to schools (ex. canteens menus, time tables etc.). The datasets could help in the identification and development of services and events for the promotion of different aspects, for example of physical activity offered through the App. Alternatively, the App could generate a dataset that the municipality could deliver as open data with a license (typically CC BY) like events for the promotion of physical activity; suggested books for children; suggested music for children; daily school canteen menus.

Third sector associations and private companies that provide products and services related, among others, to sports and leisure activities, culture and entertainment industry and food and beverages businesses were identified as potential users.