Users' involvement in digital health collaborative projects

Digital health and artificial intelligence technologies such as telemedicine, mobile health applications, clinical decision support systems, and predictive analytics are rapidly transforming healthcare delivery across diverse global settings. Although these innovations offer substantial potential to improve efficiency, expand coverage, and enhance clinical outcomes, growing concern remains that they may unintentionally reinforce or worsen existing health inequities affecting underserved populations. Because digital and artificial intelligence health research spans multiple disciplines, this narrative review synthesizes evidence from global health, health equity frameworks, artificial intelligence ethics, and sociotechnical systems to examine how digital transformation shapes equitable health outcomes. The findings show that digital and artificial intelligence tools can improve access to healthcare services, reduce geographic and logistical barriers, and enhance diagnostic accuracy. However, these benefits are not evenly distributed. Persistent disparities related to digital connectivity, affordability, digital literacy, data representation, and algorithmic performance may result in exclusion or harm among marginalized groups. To systematically explain these patterns, this review introduces the Equity Pathways Model, which identifies three interconnected mechanisms through which digital health and artificial intelligence influence equity outcomes. The Access pathway explains how digital tools can reduce traditional barriers to care while simultaneously creating new forms of exclusion linked to technology access and digital skills. The Quality of Care pathway highlights how artificial intelligence systems may enhance clinical decision making but also produce biased or unreliable outcomes for underrepresented populations. The System Structural pathway emphasizes how governance arrangements, political economy, institutional capacity, and sociocultural context shape whether digital innovations mitigate or reinforce structural inequities. Together, these pathways provide a framework for distinguishing digital health and artificial intelligence interventions that enhance equity, those that have neutral effects, and those that exacerbate disparities. The review offers an international perspective and proposes equity by design principles to guide researchers, policymakers, and technology developers in ensuring that digital health and artificial intelligence innovations contribute to the advancement of global health equity, particularly in low resource and underserved settings.

This article addresses the concept of digital public health and explores its application in the field of mental health, focusing on technology mediation as a potential tool to improve care and well-being of individuals. Scientific evidence shows that technological mediation in mental health can have a positive and significant impact on patient outcomes. However, it highlights the importance of addressing equitable access to these digital interventions and collaboration between users and mental health professionals in the design and development of effective solutions. The case of the company Saluta, a digital health center that has led several innovations in mental health through accessible and quality digital platforms, is presented. Finally, strategies are proposed to evaluate the impact of technological mediation in digital health care, including constant monitoring of results, research with solid scientific evidence, and the involvement of users in the design and evaluation process.

Project activity is a tool for diversifying the management of modern library in the conditions of high complexity and uncertainty; it is a way to complete and strengthen the power vertical by horizontal ties of self-organizing peer groups. Participation in project activities allows building a space of trust between the administration and the library staff, forming shared goals and values, and contributes to strengthening consensus.Project activities contribute to the effective solution of complex tasks facing the modern library: embedding libraries in the knowledge economy, working in the format of social hub, implementing the agenda of creative industries. By helping to build partnerships with representatives of different communities, the project activities contribute to the development of material and technical resources of library, as well as the creation of new services, products and services. In addition, project activity is an important tool for developing the creative and organizational potential of library specialists.The article discusses the experience of the Irkutsk Regional Universal Scientific Library named after I.I. Molchanov-Sibirskiy on the systematic implementation of project activities in the central regional library and the network of libraries of the Angara region. The author analyses the main tools of project activity: the Regulations on project activity of the Irkutsk Regional Universal Scientific Library, the Project Council, strategic sessions and innovative project “descents”. The paper describes the concept of the regional network socially oriented project “Library for government, society, individual”. The author gives statistics of the implemented projects, as well as determines the areas of effective application of process and project management in the library.

Mastering of new professional practice-oriented competences by library specialists is necessary for achieving positive changes in the cultural space of civil society. The article reveals prerequisites for the development of competence and qualification training of specialists of domestic libraries, mechanisms for strengthening integration of the professional education system and library information sphere. The Federal project “Creative People” within the framework of the National project “Culture” (2019—2024) is considered as a new model of professional development, an indicator of innovative activity of library specialists and consolidation of professional library community. The article presents the additional professional training programs of Krasnodar State Institute of Culture which have been developed taking into account the current trends in the organization of library activities within the frames of the Federal project “Creative People”. Implementation of library’s mission as a socio-cultural institution of society is impossible without a specialist — subject of innovation, strategist and organizer in the field of project management of activity. From this perspective, there was developed additional professional educational program “Innovative project and grant activities of libraries” tailored to top managers, deputy managers, heads of sectors and departments and methodologists of libraries. The article presents the analysis of intermediate results of fulfilment of the program aimed at acquiring new professional competence in the field of development and management of innovative projects in library-information sphere and participation in grant competitions. The author reveals the content of the program modules: innovative development of modern library, technologies of innovative project activity of modern library, grant activity of libraries. The analysis of specific features of full-time and distance learning forms under the program “Innovative project and grant activities of libraries” allows the author to make conclusion about the degree of its implementation as an interactive discussion platform for specialists of libraries of the Russian Federation.

Participation of citizens and service users is increasingly commonplace in research, policy and technology development. Alongside this development, social scientists have become increasingly incorporated into large-scale research and innovation projects to facilitate participatory spaces. This requires reflection on the mechanisms, outcomes and, ultimately, the accountabilities of participation. In this paper, we propose the lens of care framework for approaching such reflections. We illustrate its value by using it to account for our role in establishing participatory spaces as part of a European Horizon 2020-funded research and innovation project, entitled EmERGE. We describe the codesign processes we developed and implemented with the aim of enabling heterogeneous voices, distinct experiences and multiple ideas to be articulated to inform the development and implementation of a digital platform for HIV care. We show how the lens of care framework enables us to trouble participation along prior theoretical distinctions between patients/citizens roles, invited/uninvited spaces and inclusive/scientistic voices and provides novel lines of inquiry to capture the relational and emergent processes of participation in digital health innovation. In the EmERGE project, spaces of participation were co-created within and by the community, whose members skilfully arranged the material, social and temporal set-up. Within these spaces we were able to articulate voices, deliberate knowledge and study the potentialities of technology so that initial technological inscriptions of empowerment through information-push were challenged and were, eventually, replaced by more interactive forms of clinician-patient engagement in digital HIV care. Through the lens of care, this paper aims to provide a reflective tool for researchers and practitioners who are involved in the design, implementation, and evaluation of participatory projects.

In the field of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), innovation requires a relevant understanding of uses. This concern has benefited considerably from the social sciences. Specialists in sociology, psychology, marketing and ergonomics have for a long time been invited to take part in innovation projects in order to inform designers and project managers from the user’s perspective concerning the particular requirements they have of products or services. Yet one of the results of the numerous studies carried out by social scientists since the beginning of the 1980s relates to the difficulty of predicting the uses of new technological devices. A general conclusion of social science research conducted in this domain seems to be that it is quite difficult to point to precise strategies for achieving success in innovation on the basis of reliable predictions concerning their future use. Somehow, this result shows the problematic evolution of the role assigned to social sciences in innovation projects. Starting, historically, with the task of describing the practices and behaviors of people when confronted with new devices of communication, they end up with the (impossible) mission of paving a way through the territory of unpredictable uses. The hypothesis of this chapter is that this paradoxical situation teaches us more than the traditional difficulty of filling the gap between forecast and reality. The significant degree of unpredictability as regards ICT usage is the consequence of a general process of “uses drift,” a process that should be scrutinized by the managers and social scientists involved in new technology projects. In this chapter, I will study this

International audience

Digital Technologies have transformed many sectors in societies, and, increasingly, is changing the health care sector and health research. In comparison the potential of digital technologies in public health has been less explored. The workshop aims to address both the challenges and potentials of digital public health with focus on maternal and child public health. Presenters will provide examples of how digital technologies and digital health innovations can sustain and improve maternal and child health. The workshop presents three perspectives on digital maternal and child public health from different continents. This is a deliberate choice to highlight the universal and global relevance of digitalization in maternal and child public health. After the presentations, time is foreseen for a discussion on potential and limitations, as well as the generalizability of methods and results for maternal and child health globally, as well as on the question of governance in digital public health. The workshop topics will span from digital health information seeking to monitoring and the use of artificial intelligence for policy development. Each presentation covers a different technology or digital approach to public health. The presentations will critically explore how these technologies and approaches can improve public health from a local and global perspective, and will raise central issues, such as acceptance and availability of novel technologies, generalizability of results, governance and participatory approaches in the digital transformation in maternal and child health globally. Key messages Digital technologies can provide different impact for maternal and child public health depending on area of implementation, e.g. health promotion, policy development. Challenges and potentials range from specifically local and health-system related to globally generalizable factors.

Open innovation has become a mainstream phenomenon in the current business landscape. However, despite the fact that innovation projects generally have different attributes (e.g., complexity and uncertainty), most studies on open innovation have only considered firm-level characteristics (e.g., firm size and firm openness) to determine how to manage open innovation successfully. Project-level studies on open innovation management are still scant-There are only a few conceptual and qualitative articles on the topic, and there is a lack of quantitative insights. Based on a survey designed to collect detailed data from 201 innovation projects undertaken by American firms, this article provides a quantitative cross-project analysis of how two, key innovation project attributes (i.e., complexity and uncertainty) are related to five factors for successful open innovation management: 1) openness level, 2) external partner choice, 3) open innovation mechanism choice, 4) collaboration process formalization, and 5) internal firm practices. This exploratory study contributes to the open innovation literature by highlighting the importance of microfoundations (i.e., innovation project attributes) in successful open innovation management. This article concludes by suggesting a number of relevant project-level future research opportunities in the field of open innovation management, and some methodological recommendations on how to address such opportunities.

This chapter will present a series of university-industry collaboration (UIC) projects between a university industrial design research unit and various small-medium (manufacturing) enterprises (SMEs) with a focus on the facilitators role in these projects. Previous research has referred to ‘innovation intermediaries' as a term to define (service) firms that proactively facilitate collaboration between two or more parties in innovation projects. In terms of technological development these have been exemplified as research and technology organisations (RTOs). The authors suggest an adjacent term ‘intermediary interpreters' to describe the key facilitator by bringing together the term 'intermediaries' and the term ‘interpreters' as they are defined by Roberto Verganti. These individuals have specialised external expertise and ability to take part in the ‘design discourse; to support innovation. The authors argue that intermediary interpreters are an important third party in UIC projects that provide unique support that can help SMEs embrace innovation strategy and more effectively internationalise.

Digital green innovation management activities are the core of low-carbon intelligent development of prefabricated construction enterprises (PCEs) for sustainable urban development. PCEs have to seek joint venture partners to avoid the financial risk of digital green innovation projects. The purpose of this study is to develop a conceptual partner selection framework for the digital green innovation management of prefabricated construction towards urban building 5.0. In this study, first, symbiosis theory and six analysis methods were integrated to innovatively build a 3W1H-P framework system for the joint venture capital partner selection of digital green innovation projects. Second, the dual combination weighting method was innovatively proposed to avoid subjective and objective deviation in attribute weight and time weight. Finally, empirical research was carried out to verify the scientific nature, reliability, and practicability of the framework system and selection model. The results of this study show that the framework system and selection model proposed can be used to assist PCEs to select joint investment partners of digital green and innovative projects for sustainable urban development.

The article explores the theoretical and methodological principles of managing innovation and investment projects of enterprises in the context of ensuring sustainable development. The economic essence of innovation and investment projects is revealed and their role in the modernization of production, the introduction of new technologies and increasing the efficiency of economic activity of enterprises is determined. The main principles and functions of management of innovation and investment projects are analyzed, as well as the features of the integration of innovation and investment components into the system of strategic management of the enterprise. Considerable attention is paid to revealing the essence of the concept of sustainable development and substantiating the relationship between the economic, environmental and social components of the enterprise’s activity. It is proven that innovation and investment projects are an important tool for implementing strategic changes aimed at increasing the resource efficiency of production, introducing environmentally friendly technologies and ensuring the social responsibility of business. Modern approaches to the management of innovation and investment projects and sustainable development of the enterprise are summarized, in particular, the systemic, process, strategic, innovative, risk-oriented, integration and stakeholder approaches. Conceptual provisions for the formation of a mechanism for managing innovation and investment projects of an enterprise are proposed, taking into account the principles of sustainable development, which provide for the integration of criteria of economic efficiency, environmental safety and social effectiveness into the system of planning, implementation and control of project activities. The implementation of the proposed approaches will contribute to increasing the efficiency of innovation and investment activities of enterprises, strengthening their economic sustainability and ensuring long-term sustainable development.

Literature suggests that big data is a new competitive advantage and that it enhance organizational performance. Yet, previous empirical research has provided conflicting results. Building on the resource-based view and the organizational inertia theory, we develop a model to investigate how big data and big data analytics capability affect innovation success. We show that there is a trade-off between big data and big data analytics capability and that optimal balance of big data depends upon levels of big data analytics capability. We conduct a four-year empirical research project to secure empirical data on 1109 data-driven innovation projects from the United States and China. This research is the first time reporting the empirical results. The study findings reveal several surprising results that challenge traditional views of the importance of big data in innovation. For U.S. innovation projects, big data has an inverted U-shaped relationship with sales growth. Big data analytics capability exerts a positive moderating effect, that is, the stronger this capability is, the greater the impact of big data on sales growth and gross margin. For Chinese innovation projects, when big data resource is low, promoting big data analytics capability increases sales growth and gross margin up to a certain point; developing big data analytics capability beyond that point may actually inhibit innovation performance. Our findings provide guidance to firms on making strategic decisions regarding resource allocations for big data and big data analytics capability.

Pharmaceutical firms frequently engage in preclinical research collaboration with universities. Many of these collaborative preclinical research projects are conducted by firms’ subsidiaries. In this setting, the challenge of transferring knowledge from university–industry collaborations (UICs) to internal research and development (R&D) increases, since knowledge has to be transferred twice: to the subsidiary and to the parent. To benefit from tacit and complex knowledge obtained through collaboration with academic partners, firms need to have a high absorptive capacity. However, existing research on absorptive capacity's effect on the efficacy of UIC has provided mixed results, and the knowledge transfer mechanisms remain unclear, particularly in the case of basic (or preclinical) research and of the complex knowledge transfer process from subsidiaries’ collaborative efforts. Building on the knowledge‐based view and following a multidimensional perspective of absorptive capacity, this study investigates the role a firm's capabilities play in successful university knowledge integration in a firm's internal R&D. Therefore, this paper analyzes both parent firms’ UICs and their subsidiaries’ UICs in basic (preclinical) research. The results of our longitudinal analysis of a unique panel data set of 56 global pharmaceutical firms indicate that firms do successfully exploit valuable knowledge from preclinical research UIC in internal R&D, measured by the number of performed clinical trials. This holds true for the UIC involving the parent firm and its subsidiaries. As transformative learning dimensions of absorptive capacity, high diversity in therapeutic activity and high R&D intensity levels strengthen the positive relationship between parents’ UIC and R&D performance. A high exploration intensity level of the firm and high diversity in therapeutic activity help to transfer the knowledge from subsidiaries’ preclinical research UIC to parents’ innovation projects.

More is not always better: Effects of collaboration breadth and depth on radical and incremental innovation performance at the project level