A novel extended approach under hesitant fuzzy sets to design a framework for assessing the key challenges of digital health interventions adoption during the COVID-19 outbreak

Abbas Mardani; Mahyar Kamali Saraji; Arunodaya Raj Mishra; Pratibha Rani

doi:10.1016/j.asoc.2020.106613

A novel extended approach under hesitant fuzzy sets to design a framework for assessing the key challenges of digital health interventions adoption during the COVID-19 outbreak

Appl Soft Comput. 2020 Nov:96:106613. doi: 10.1016/j.asoc.2020.106613. Epub 2020 Aug 7.

Authors

Abbas Mardani^{1

2}, Mahyar Kamali Saraji³, Arunodaya Raj Mishra⁴, Pratibha Rani⁵

Affiliations

¹ Informetrics Research Group, Ton Duc Thang University, 758307 Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam.
² Faculty of Business Administration, Ton Duc Thang University, 758307 Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam.
³ Faculty of Economics, Management, and Accounting, Yazd University, Yazd, Iran.
⁴ Department of Mathematics, Govt. College Jaitwara, Satna (MP), India.
⁵ Department of Mathematics, National Institute of Technology, Warangal 506004, India.

Abstract

In recent years, Digital Technologies (DTs) are becoming an inseparable part of human lives. Thus, many scholars have conducted research to develop new tools and applications. Processing information, usually in the form of binary code, is the main task in DTs, which is happening through many devices, including computers, smartphones, robots, and applications. Surprisingly, the role of DTs has been highlighted in people's life due to the COVID-19 pandemic. There are several different challenges to implement and intervene in DTs during the COVID-19 outbreak; therefore, the present study extended a new fuzzy approach under Hesitant Fuzzy Set (HFS) approach using Stepwise Weight Assessment Ratio Analysis (SWARA) and Weighted Aggregated Sum Product Assessment (WASPAS) method to evaluate and rank the critical challenges of DTs intervention to control the COVID-19 outbreak. In this regard, a comprehensive survey using literature and in-depth interviews have been carried out to identify the challenges under the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) framework. Moreover, the SWARA procedure is applied to analyze and assess the challenges to DTs intervention during the COVID-19 outbreak, and the WASPAS approach is utilized to rank the DTs under hesitant fuzzy sets. Further, to demonstrate the efficacy and practicability of the developed framework, an illustrative case study has been analyzed. The results of this study found that Health Information Systems (HIS) was ranked as the first factor among other factors followed by a lack of digital knowledge, digital stratification, economic interventions, lack of reliable data, and cost inefficiency In conclusion, to confirm the steadiness and strength of the proposed framework, the obtained outputs are compared with other methods.

Keywords: COVID-19 pandemic; Digital technologies; Fuzzy decision making; Healthcare systems; Hesitant fuzzy sets; MCDM; SWARA; WASPAS.