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Digital health technologies (DHTs) at the intersection of health, medical informatics, and business aim to enhance patient care through personalised digital approaches. Ensuring the efficacy and reliability of these innovations demands rigorous clinical validation. A PubMed literature review (January 2006 to July 2023) identified 1250 papers, highlighting growing academic interest. A focused narrative review (January 2018 to July 2023) delved into challenges, highlighting issues such as diverse regulatory landscapes, adoption issues in complex healthcare systems, and a plethora of evaluation frameworks lacking pragmatic guidance. Existing frameworks often omit crucial criteria, neglect empirical evidence, and clinical effectiveness is rarely included as a criterion for DHT quality. The paper underscores the urgency of addressing challenges in accreditation, adoption, business models, and integration to safeguard the quality, efficacy, and safety of DHTs. A pivotal illustration of collaborative efforts to address these challenges is exemplified by the Digital Health Validation Center, dedicated to generating clinical evidence of innovative healthcare technologies and facilitating seamless technology transfer. In conclusion, it is necessary to harmonise evaluation approaches and frameworks, improve regulatory clarity, and commit to collaboration to integrate rigorous clinical validation and empirical evidence throughout the DHT life cycle.

The exploration of patterns of health beliefs about COVID-19 among nursing students may be beneficial to identify behaviors, attitudes and knowledge about contagion risk. We sought to analyze the variables of risk perception, perceived risk factors, coping style, sense of coherence and knowledge of preventive measures as possible predictors of having suffered from COVID-19. Participants were nursing students from 13 universities in Spain. Sociodemographic and health variables were collected. To test the independent variables, the Perception Risk Coping Knowledge (PRCK-COVID-19) scale was created and validated because there was no specific survey for young people adapted to the pandemic situation of COVID-19. It was validated with adequate psychometric properties. A total of 1562 students (87.5% female, mean age 21.5 ± 5.7 years) responded. The high perception of the risk of contagion, the high level of knowledge and a coping style focused on the situation were notable. Significant differences by gender were found in the coping styles, problem-focused, avoidance and knowledge scales, with women scoring higher in all categories. The multiple regression analysis was significant (F = 3.68; p < 0.001). The predictor variables were the coping styles subscale search for support and the intrinsic and extrinsic perceived risk factors. Our model predicts that nursing students with a social support-based coping style are at a higher risk of becoming infected with COVID-19, based on their own health belief model.

Accelerated ageing is implicated in the pathogenesis of respiratory diseases as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but recent evidence indicates that the COPD can have roots early in life. Here we hypothesise that the accelerated ageing markers might have a role in the pathobiology of young COPD. The objective of this study was to compare two hallmarks of ageing, telomere length (TL), and mitochondrial DNA copy number (mtDNA-CN, as a surrogate marker of mitochondrial dysfunction) in young (≤ 50 years) and old (>50 years) smokers, with and without COPD. Both, TL and mtDNA-CN were measured in whole blood DNA by quantitative PCR [qPCR] in: (1) young ever smokers with (n = 81) or without (n = 166) COPD; and (2) old ever smokers with (n = 159) or without (n = 29) COPD. A multivariable linear regression was used to assess the association of TL and mtDNA-CN with lung function. We observed that in the entire study population, TL and mtDNA-CN decreased with age, and the former but not the latter related to FEV1/FVC (%), FEV1 (% ref.), and DLCO (% ref.). The short telomeres were found both in the young and old patients with severe COPD (FEV1