TATOO - Touchscreen Assessment TOOL for assessing the older adult's functions while operating the touch screen

In today's highly technology-oriented world, touch screen technology (TST) is rapidly becoming essential for participation in social, personal, and occupational activities1, and is becoming more prevalent due to its convenience, design flexibility, and the ease involved in manipulating touch interfaces2. When an older person uses a TST, ideally, this should meet his/her needs perfectly and instantly which make them confident and happy to be using such a product. However, the reality of such an experience for many of them lead to frustration and eventually to under usage of the technology. One of the reasons is poor device selection. Purpose Assistive technology professionals are aware of the lack of dependable assessment tools to determine clients' behavior and needs in AT selection in general and in TST in particular3. The aim of this study was to describe the processes of reaching consensus regarding the assessment of the user's skills required to operate various touch screen devices for developing the tool named TATOO. Method A six-step procedure was used to collect and validate the required skills by a multidisciplinary team of 52 experts. Content validity was calculated to determine the agreement levels between the experts. Results & Discussion The final version of the tool includes 15 domains and 50 skills/measurements. The result of Cronbach's a test for the final assessment questionnaire was 0.94, which indicates a high degree of internal consistency4. Each of the skills appearing in the final questionnaire was illustrated in a flowchart in preparation for developing TATOO as a software application. A prototype for the main skills was developed in a comprehensive and objective manner, with a summary report presented through a graphic display. Quality assurance process was performed and all of TATOO's components were tested by the technical team and ten occupational therapists. The development of TATOO may contribute to bridging the existing gap in the assessment tools for determining older adults' needs to operate TST and to provide tailor-made recommendations. This may help AT experts to get new information and measurements about TST.