Abstract

Background: Various studies have suggested storytelling, participatory research, and educational approaches as alternative cardiac recovery improvement strategies. A digital storytelling approach, the digital storytelling transformation framework (DSTF) suggested the power of storytelling to influence human behavior in public health interventions. Could DSTF be applied as a cardiac rehabilitation intervention approach and as a data representation tool for an intervention population? Aims: This study sought to (1) test DSTF as a data representation tool, (2) identify major cardiac rehabilitation intervention themes for people living with CVDs, and (3) suggest a user-based behavior change model using a digital storytelling approach. Methods: This study used a qualitative approach and research paradigm based on interpretative phenomenological analysis. Conclusion: The study concludes that a digital storytelling approach may be applied as a data representation tool through an imaginative or live data simulation into text or other communication formats, and as an alternative approach in cardiac rehabilitation interventions, through participants’ interactions, inter-activities, and coordinated safeguarding. The study also affirms that because behavior change does not take place in isolation, a digital storytelling approach may bring about behavioral modification in the similitude of complex ecosystem interactions and inter-activities among participants in clustered access within a digital space.