Integrated Pediatric Wellness Programs Supporting Adolescent Emotional Health through Smart Healthcare Technologies

Abstract

The emotional health of adolescents is currently of priority interest to the general public since growing anxiety, stress levels, emotional instability, and psychosocial problems have an adverse impact on academic performance, social interaction, and subsequent life quality. The purpose of the study was to determine how well integrated pediatric wellness programs with the assistance of smart healthcare technologies can enhance emotional health, access to health care, acceptance of technologies, and satisfaction of the participants. The cross-sectional analytical study was undertaken between 2026 (January to April) among 200 adolescents aged between 13-18 years with stratified random sampling of four secondary schools and three pediatric healthcare facilities. The intervention combined pediatric wellness education, emotional resilience trainings, family-centered counseling, AI-based emotional health screenings, and mobile health applications, telehealth visits, wearable health trackers, and online follow-ups. Standardized questionnaires with measures of emotional health, involvement in the wellness program, use of smart healthcare technologies, and satisfaction with the use of these technologies were used to collect data. Descriptive statistics, chi-square test, Pearson correlation and multiple linear regression were used as statistical tests at a significance level of p < 0.05 to perform statistical analysis. The findings revealed that 56.0% of participants were girls and 44.0% were boys and the average age of the participants was 15.6 ± 1.7 years. In general, the percentage of adolescents who engaged in pediatric wellness activities regularly was 82.5, whereas 88.0% of them used at least one smart technology in healthcare in an active manner. The average score of emotional health was significantly higher than when the baseline was done (61.8 + 8.5) and when the participation was done (78.6 + 7.2) (p < 0.001). Technology acceptance was at 90.5 and general satisfaction of the participants were at 92.0. Pediatric participation in wellness was positively linked to emotional health outcomes (r = 0.71, p < 0.001) and smart technology use in healthcare was a predictor of better emotional health (β = 0.43, p < 0.001) on its own. These results suggest that school-based pediatric wellness programs using smart healthcare devices have a much greater impact on the emotional health of adolescents, their increased engagement with preventive healthcare services, and high rates of technology acceptance and user satisfaction, which is why they can be effectively implemented in school and community-wide pediatric care systems.