WorldWideScience

Sample records for health records affect

  1. Factors Affecting Usage of a Personal Health Record (PHR) to Manage Health

    Science.gov (United States)

    Taha, Jessica; Czaja, Sara J.; Sharit, Joseph; Morrow, Daniel G.

    2018-01-01

    As the health care industry shifts into the digital age, patients are increasingly being provided with access to electronic personal health records (PHRs) that are tethered to their provider-maintained electronic health records. This unprecedented access to personal health information can enable patients to more effectively manage their health, but little is actually known about patients’ ability to successfully use a PHR to perform health management tasks or the individual factors that influence task performance. This study evaluated the ability of 56 middle-aged adults (40–59 years) and 51 older adults (60–85 years) to use a simulated PHR to perform 15 common health management tasks encompassing medication management, review/interpretation of lab/test results, and health maintenance activities. Results indicated that participants in both age groups experienced significant difficulties in using the PHR to complete routine health management tasks. Data also showed that older adults, particularly those with lower numeracy and technology experience, encountered greater problems using the system. Furthermore, data revealed that the cognitive abilities predicting one’s task performance varied according to the complexity of the task. Results from this study identify important factors to consider in the design of PHRs so that they meet the needs of middle-aged and older adults. As deployment of PHRs is on the rise, knowledge of the individual factors that impact effective PHR use is critical to preventing an increase in health care disparities between those who are able to use a PHR and those who are not. PMID:24364414

  2. Patient experiences with full electronic access to health records and clinical notes through the My HealtheVet Personal Health Record Pilot: qualitative study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Woods, Susan S; Schwartz, Erin; Tuepker, Anais; Press, Nancy A; Nazi, Kim M; Turvey, Carolyn L; Nichol, W Paul

    2013-03-27

    Full sharing of the electronic health record with patients has been identified as an important opportunity to engage patients in their health and health care. The My HealtheVet Pilot, the initial personal health record of the US Department of Veterans Affairs, allowed patients and their delegates to view and download content in their electronic health record, including clinical notes, laboratory tests, and imaging reports. A qualitative study with purposeful sampling sought to examine patients' views and experiences with reading their health records, including their clinical notes, online. Five focus group sessions were conducted with patients and family members who enrolled in the My HealtheVet Pilot at the Portland Veterans Administration Medical Center, Oregon. A total of 30 patients enrolled in the My HealtheVet Pilot, and 6 family members who had accessed and viewed their electronic health records participated in the sessions. Four themes characterized patient experiences with reading the full complement of their health information. Patients felt that seeing their records positively affected communication with providers and the health system, enhanced knowledge of their health and improved self-care, and allowed for greater participation in the quality of their care such as follow-up of abnormal test results or decision-making on when to seek care. While some patients felt that seeing previously undisclosed information, derogatory language, or inconsistencies in their notes caused challenges, they overwhelmingly felt that having more, rather than less, of their health record information provided benefits. Patients and their delegates had predominantly positive experiences with health record transparency and the open sharing of notes and test results. Viewing their records appears to empower patients and enhance their contributions to care, calling into question common provider concerns about the effect of full record access on patient well-being. While shared

  3. The E-health Literacy Demands of Australia's My Health Record: A Heuristic Evaluation of Usability.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Walsh, Louisa; Hemsley, Bronwyn; Allan, Meredith; Adams, Natalie; Balandin, Susan; Georgiou, Andrew; Higgins, Isabel; McCarthy, Shaun; Hill, Sophie

    2017-01-01

    My Health Record is Australia's electronic personal health record system, which was introduced in July 2012. As of August 2017, approximately 21 percent of Australia's total population was registered to use My Health Record. Internationally, usability issues have been shown to negatively influence the uptake and use of electronic health record systems, and this scenario may particularly affect people who have low e-health literacy. It is likely that usability issues are negatively affecting the uptake and use of My Health Record in Australia. To identify potential e-health literacy-related usability issues within My Health Record through a heuristic evaluation method. Between September 14 and October 12, 2016, three of the authors conducted a heuristic evaluation of the two consumer-facing components of My Health Record-the information website and the electronic health record itself. These two components were evaluated against two sets of heuristics-the Health Literacy Online checklist and the Monkman Heuristics. The Health Literacy Online checklist and Monkman Heuristics are evidence-based checklists of web design elements with a focus on design for audiences with low health literacy. During this heuristic evaluation, the investigators individually navigated through the consumer-facing components of My Health Record, recording instances where the My Health Record did not conform to the checklist criteria. After the individual evaluations were completed, the investigators conferred and aggregated their results. From this process, a list of usability violations was constructed. When evaluated against the Health Literacy Online Checklist, the information website demonstrated violations in 12 of 35 criteria, and the electronic health record demonstrated violations in 16 of 35 criteria. When evaluated against the Monkman Heuristics, the information website demonstrated violations in 7 of 11 criteria, and the electronic health record demonstrated violations in 9 of 11

  4. Clinical genomics in the world of the electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marsolo, Keith; Spooner, S Andrew

    2013-10-01

    The widespread adoption of electronic health records presents a number of benefits to the field of clinical genomics. They include the ability to return results to the practitioner, to use genetic findings in clinical decision support, and to have data collected in the electronic health record that serve as a source of phenotypic information for analysis purposes. Not all electronic health records are created equal, however. They differ in their features, capabilities, and ease of use. Therefore, to understand the potential of the electronic health record, it is first necessary to understand its capabilities and the impact that implementation strategy has on usability. Specifically, we focus on the following areas: (i) how the electronic health record is used to capture data in clinical practice settings; (ii) how the implementation and configuration of the electronic health record affect the quality and availability of data; (iii) the management of clinical genetic test results and the feasibility of electronic health record integration; and (iv) the challenges of implementing an electronic health record in a research-intensive environment. This is followed by a discussion of the minimum functional requirements that an electronic health record must meet to enable the satisfactory integration of genomic results as well as the open issues that remain.

  5. Electronic health records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kierkegaard, Patrick

    2011-01-01

    that a centralised European health record system will become a reality even before 2020. However, the concept of a centralised supranational central server raises concern about storing electronic medical records in a central location. The privacy threat posed by a supranational network is a key concern. Cross......-border and Interoperable electronic health record systems make confidential data more easily and rapidly accessible to a wider audience and increase the risk that personal data concerning health could be accidentally exposed or easily distributed to unauthorised parties by enabling greater access to a compilation...... of the personal data concerning health, from different sources, and throughout a lifetime....

  6. Quality of nursing documentation: Paper-based health records versus electronic-based health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Akhu-Zaheya, Laila; Al-Maaitah, Rowaida; Bany Hani, Salam

    2018-02-01

    To assess and compare the quality of paper-based and electronic-based health records. The comparison examined three criteria: content, documentation process and structure. Nursing documentation is a significant indicator of the quality of patient care delivery. It can be either paper-based or organised within the system known as the electronic health records. Nursing documentation must be completed at the highest standards, to ensure the safety and quality of healthcare services. However, the evidence is not clear on which one of the two forms of documentation (paper-based versus electronic health records is more qualified. A retrospective, descriptive, comparative design was used to address the study's purposes. A convenient number of patients' records, from two public hospitals, were audited using the Cat-ch-Ing audit instrument. The sample size consisted of 434 records for both paper-based health records and electronic health records from medical and surgical wards. Electronic health records were better than paper-based health records in terms of process and structure. In terms of quantity and quality content, paper-based records were better than electronic health records. The study affirmed the poor quality of nursing documentation and lack of nurses' knowledge and skills in the nursing process and its application in both paper-based and electronic-based systems. Both forms of documentation revealed drawbacks in terms of content, process and structure. This study provided important information, which can guide policymakers and administrators in identifying effective strategies aimed at enhancing the quality of nursing documentation. Policies and actions to ensure quality nursing documentation at the national level should focus on improving nursing knowledge, competencies, practice in nursing process, enhancing the work environment and nursing workload, as well as strengthening the capacity building of nursing practice to improve the quality of nursing care and

  7. Sharing electronic health records: the patient view

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    John Powell

    2006-03-01

    Full Text Available The introduction of a national electronic health record system to the National Health Service (NHS has raised concerns about issues of data accuracy, security and confidentiality. The primary aim of this project was to identify the extent to which primary care patients will allow their local electronic record data to be shared on a national database. The secondary aim was to identify the extent of inaccuracies in the existing primary care records, which will be used to populate the new national Spine. Fifty consecutive attenders to one general practitioner were given a paper printout of their full primary care electronic health record. Participants were asked to highlight information which they would not want to be shared on the national electronic database of records, and information which they considered to be incorrect. There was a 62% response rate (31/50. Five of the 31 patients (16% identified information that they would not want to be shared on the national record system. The items they identified related almost entirely to matters of pregnancy, contraception, sexual health and mental health. Ten respondents (32% identified incorrect information in their records (some of these turned out to be correct on further investigation. The findings in relation to data sharing fit with the commonly held assumption that matters related to sensitive or embarrassing issues, which may affect how the patient will be treated by other individuals or institutions, are most likely to be censored by patients. Previous work on this has tended to ask hypothetical questions concerning data sharing rather than examine a real situation. A larger study of representative samples of patients in both primary and secondary care settings is needed to further investigate issues of data sharing and consent.

  8. Health-oriented electronic oral health record: development and evaluation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wongsapai, Mansuang; Suebnukarn, Siriwan; Rajchagool, Sunsanee; Beach, Daryl; Kawaguchi, Sachiko

    2014-06-01

    This study aims to develop and evaluate a new Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record that implements the health-oriented status and intervention index. The index takes the principles of holistic oral healthcare and applies them to the design and implementation of the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record. We designed an experiment using focus groups and a consensus (Delphi process) method to develop a new health-oriented status and intervention index and graphical user interface. A comparative intervention study with qualitative and quantitative methods was used to compare an existing Electronic Oral Health Record to the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record, focusing on dentist satisfaction, accuracy, and completeness of oral health status recording. The study was conducted by the dental staff of the Inter-country Center for Oral Health collaborative hospitals in Thailand. Overall, the user satisfaction questionnaire had a positive response to the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record. The dentists found it easy to use and were generally satisfied with the impact on their work, oral health services, and surveillance. The dentists were significantly satisfied with the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record compared to the existing Electronic Oral Health Record (p health information recorded using the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record were 97.15 and 93.74 percent, respectively. This research concludes that the Health-oriented Electronic Oral Health Record satisfied many dentists, provided benefits to holistic oral healthcare, and facilitated the planning, managing, and evaluation of the healthcare delivery system.

  9. Electronic Health Records in the Cloud: Improving Primary Health Care Delivery in South Africa.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cilliers, Liezel; Wright, Graham

    2017-01-01

    In South Africa, the recording of health data is done manually in a paper-based file, while attempts to digitize healthcare records have had limited success. In many countries, Electronic Health Records (EHRs) has developed in silos, with little or no integration between different operational systems. Literature has provided evidence that the cloud can be used to 'leapfrog' some of these implementation issues, but the adoption of this technology in the public health care sector has been very limited. This paper aims to identify the major reasons why the cloud has not been used to implement EHRs for the South African public health care system, and to provide recommendations of how to overcome these challenges. From the literature, it is clear that there are technology, environmental and organisational challenges affecting the implementation of EHRs in the cloud. Four recommendations are provided that can be used by the National Department of Health to implement EHRs making use of the cloud.

  10. Personal factors affecting organizational commitment of records ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This study investigated personal factors affecting organizational commitment among records management personnel in the state universities in Nigeria. Simple cluster sampling with equal allocation method was used to select 180 records management personnel from the study population. A five item organizational ...

  11. Electronic records management in the public health sector of the ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Ngulup

    records) ... cally related administrative decision-making and problem-solving. ... This implies that a successful e-health system needs maximum support from proper ...... disaster backup for recovery in case it is affected by disaster like fire and water.

  12. Personal Health Records: A Systematic Literature Review.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Roehrs, Alex; da Costa, Cristiano André; Righi, Rodrigo da Rosa; de Oliveira, Kleinner Silva Farias

    2017-01-06

    Information and communication technology (ICT) has transformed the health care field worldwide. One of the main drivers of this change is the electronic health record (EHR). However, there are still open issues and challenges because the EHR usually reflects the partial view of a health care provider without the ability for patients to control or interact with their data. Furthermore, with the growth of mobile and ubiquitous computing, the number of records regarding personal health is increasing exponentially. This movement has been characterized as the Internet of Things (IoT), including the widespread development of wearable computing technology and assorted types of health-related sensors. This leads to the need for an integrated method of storing health-related data, defined as the personal health record (PHR), which could be used by health care providers and patients. This approach could combine EHRs with data gathered from sensors or other wearable computing devices. This unified view of patients' health could be shared with providers, who may not only use previous health-related records but also expand them with data resulting from their interactions. Another PHR advantage is that patients can interact with their health data, making decisions that may positively affect their health. This work aimed to explore the recent literature related to PHRs by defining the taxonomy and identifying challenges and open questions. In addition, this study specifically sought to identify data types, standards, profiles, goals, methods, functions, and architecture with regard to PHRs. The method to achieve these objectives consists of using the systematic literature review approach, which is guided by research questions using the population, intervention, comparison, outcome, and context (PICOC) criteria. As a result, we reviewed more than 5000 scientific studies published in the last 10 years, selected the most significant approaches, and thoroughly surveyed the health

  13. Perceptions of electronic health record implementation: a statewide survey of physicians in Rhode Island.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wylie, Matthew C; Baier, Rosa R; Gardner, Rebekah L

    2014-10-01

    Although electronic health record use improves healthcare delivery, adoption into clinical practice is incomplete. We sought to identify the extent of adoption in Rhode Island and the characteristics of physicians and electronic health records associated with positive experience. We performed a cross-sectional study of data collected by the Rhode Island Department of Health for the Health Information Technology Survey 2009 to 2013. Survey questions included provider and practice demographics, health record information, and Likert-type scaled questions regarding how electronic health record use affected clinical practice. The survey response rate ranged from 50% to 65%, with 62% in 2013. Increasing numbers of physicians in Rhode Island use an electronic health record. In 2013, 81% of physicians used one, and adoption varied by clinical subspecialty. Most providers think that electronic health record use improves billing and quality improvement but has not improved job satisfaction. Physicians with longer and more sophisticated electronic health record use report positive effects of introduction on all aspects of practice examined (P electronic health record introduction (P electronic health record vendors most frequently used in Rhode Island, 5 were associated with improved job satisfaction. We report the largest statewide study of electronic health record adoption to date. We found increasing physician use in Rhode Island, and the extent of adoption varies by subspecialty. Although older physicians are less likely to be positive about electronic health record adoption, longer and more sophisticated use are associated with more positive opinions, suggesting acceptance will grow over time. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  14. Health Care Personnel Perception of the Privacy of Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Saito, Kenji; Shofer, Frances S; Saberi, Poune; Green-McKenzie, Judith

    2017-06-01

    : Health care facilities are increasingly converting paper medical records to electronic health records. This study investigates the perception of privacy health care personnel have of electronic health records. A pilot tested, anonymous survey was administered to a convenience sample of health care personnel. Standard summary statistics and Chi-square analysis were used to assess differences in perception. Of the 93% (96/103) who responded, 65% were female and 43% white. The mean age was 44.3 years. Most (94%) felt that Medical Record privacy was important and one-third reported they would not seek care at their workplace if Electronic Health Records were used. Efforts to assure and communicate the integrity of electronic health records are essential toward reducing deterrents for health care personnel to access geographically convenient and timely health care.

  15. Electronic health records for dummies

    CERN Document Server

    Williams, Trenor

    2010-01-01

    The straight scoop on choosing and implementing an electronic health records (EHR) system Doctors, nurses, and hospital and clinic administrators are interested in learning the best ways to implement and use an electronic health records system so that they can be shared across different health care settings via a network-connected information system. This helpful, plain-English guide provides need-to-know information on how to choose the right system, assure patients of the security of their records, and implement an EHR in such a way that it causes minimal disruption to the daily demands of a

  16. Using the Electronic Health Record in Nursing Research: Challenges and Opportunities.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Samuels, Joanne G; McGrath, Robert J; Fetzer, Susan J; Mittal, Prashant; Bourgoine, Derek

    2015-10-01

    Changes in the patient record from the paper to the electronic health record format present challenges and opportunities for the nurse researcher. Current use of data from the electronic health record is in a state of flux. Novel data analytic techniques and massive data sets provide new opportunities for nursing science. Realization of a strong electronic data output future relies on meeting challenges of system use and operability, data presentation, and privacy. Nurse researchers need to rethink aspects of proposal development. Joining ongoing national efforts aimed at creating usable data output is encouraged as a means to affect system design. Working to address challenges and embrace opportunities will help grow the science in a way that answers important patient care questions. © The Author(s) 2015.

  17. 42 CFR 491.10 - Patient health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... 42 Public Health 5 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Patient health records. 491.10 Section 491.10...: Conditions for Certification; and FQHCs Conditions for Coverage § 491.10 Patient health records. (a) Records... systematically organized. (3) For each patient receiving health care services, the clinic or center maintains a...

  18. Electronic health records to facilitate clinical research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cowie, Martin R; Blomster, Juuso I; Curtis, Lesley H; Duclaux, Sylvie; Ford, Ian; Fritz, Fleur; Goldman, Samantha; Janmohamed, Salim; Kreuzer, Jörg; Leenay, Mark; Michel, Alexander; Ong, Seleen; Pell, Jill P; Southworth, Mary Ross; Stough, Wendy Gattis; Thoenes, Martin; Zannad, Faiez; Zalewski, Andrew

    2017-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) provide opportunities to enhance patient care, embed performance measures in clinical practice, and facilitate clinical research. Concerns have been raised about the increasing recruitment challenges in trials, burdensome and obtrusive data collection, and uncertain generalizability of the results. Leveraging electronic health records to counterbalance these trends is an area of intense interest. The initial applications of electronic health records, as the primary data source is envisioned for observational studies, embedded pragmatic or post-marketing registry-based randomized studies, or comparative effectiveness studies. Advancing this approach to randomized clinical trials, electronic health records may potentially be used to assess study feasibility, to facilitate patient recruitment, and streamline data collection at baseline and follow-up. Ensuring data security and privacy, overcoming the challenges associated with linking diverse systems and maintaining infrastructure for repeat use of high quality data, are some of the challenges associated with using electronic health records in clinical research. Collaboration between academia, industry, regulatory bodies, policy makers, patients, and electronic health record vendors is critical for the greater use of electronic health records in clinical research. This manuscript identifies the key steps required to advance the role of electronic health records in cardiovascular clinical research.

  19. Extended use of electronic health records by primary care physicians: Does the electronic health record artefact matter?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Raymond, Louis; Paré, Guy; Marchand, Marie

    2017-04-01

    The deployment of electronic health record systems is deemed to play a decisive role in the transformations currently being implemented in primary care medical practices. This study aims to characterize electronic health record systems from the perspective of family physicians. To achieve this goal, we conducted a survey of physicians practising in private clinics located in Quebec, Canada. We used valid responses from 331 respondents who were found to be representative of the larger population. Data provided by the physicians using the top three electronic health record software products were analysed in order to obtain statistically adequate sub-sample sizes. Significant differences were observed among the three products with regard to their functional capability. The extent to which each of the electronic health record functionalities are used by physicians also varied significantly. Our results confirm that the electronic health record artefact 'does matter', its clinical functionalities explaining why certain physicians make more extended use of their system than others.

  20. The Copenhagen School Health Records Register

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Baker, Jennifer L; Sørensen, Thorkild I A

    2011-01-01

    The Copenhagen School Health Records Register is an electronic register of health examination information on 372,636 children who attended school in Copenhagen, Denmark from 1936 to 2005.......The Copenhagen School Health Records Register is an electronic register of health examination information on 372,636 children who attended school in Copenhagen, Denmark from 1936 to 2005....

  1. Beneficial Effects of Two Types of Personal Health Record Services Connected With Electronic Medical Records Within the Hospital Setting.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lee, Jisan; Kim, James G Boram; Jin, Meiling; Ahn, Kiwhan; Kim, Byungjun; Kim, Sukwha; Kim, Jeongeun

    2017-11-01

    Healthcare consumers must be able to make decisions based on accurate health information. To assist with this, we designed and developed an integrated system connected with electronic medical records in hospitals to ensure delivery of accurate health information. The system-called the Consumer-centered Open Personal Health Record platform-is composed of two services: a portal for users with any disease and a mobile application for users with cleft lip/palate. To assess the benefits of these services, we used a quasi-experimental, pretest-posttest design, assigning participants to the portal (n = 50) and application (n = 52) groups. Both groups showed significantly increased knowledge, both objective (actual knowledge of health information) and subjective (perceived knowledge of health information), after the intervention. Furthermore, while both groups showed higher information needs satisfaction after the intervention, the application group was significantly more satisfied. Knowledge changes were more affected by participant characteristics in the application group. Our results may be due to the application's provision of specific disease information and a personalized treatment plan based on the participant and other users' data. We recommend that services connected with electronic medical records target specific diseases to provide personalized health management to patients in a hospital setting.

  2. Electronic health records: eliciting behavioral health providers' beliefs.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shank, Nancy; Willborn, Elizabeth; Pytlikzillig, Lisa; Noel, Harmonijoie

    2012-04-01

    Interviews with 32 community behavioral health providers elicited perceived benefits and barriers of using electronic health records. Themes identified were (a) quality of care, (b) privacy and security, and (c) delivery of services. Benefits to quality of care were mentioned by 100% of the providers, and barriers by 59% of providers. Barriers involving privacy and security concerns were mentioned by 100% of providers, and benefits by 22%. Barriers to delivery of services were mentioned by 97% of providers, and benefits by 66%. Most providers (81%) expressed overall positive support for electronic behavioral health records.

  3. Electronic Health Records: PHR Opportunities for Public Health – Part 2

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    In this podcast, Dr. Ken Mandl discusses electronic health records and personally-controlled health records. Dr. Mandl leads the IndivoHealth personally-controlled health record project, the original reference model for the Microsoft, Google, and Dossia personal health records (PHRs or PCHRs). He has successfully used PHRs for immunization and influenza, leads efforts in real-time surveillance systems, and is currently adapting personal health records for longitudinal and genomic research. The lecture was given at CDC on June 19, 2009.

  4. Electronic Health Records: PHR Opportunities for Public Health – Part 1

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    In this podcast, Dr. Ken Mandl discusses electronic health records and personally-controlled health records. Dr. Mandl leads the IndivoHealth personally-controlled health record project, the original reference model for the Microsoft, Google, and Dossia personal health records (PHRs or PCHRs). He has successfully used PHRs for immunization and influenza, leads efforts in real-time surveillance systems, and is currently adapting personal health records for longitudinal and genomic research. The lecture was given at CDC on June 19, 2009.

  5. Electronic health records to facilitate clinical research

    OpenAIRE

    Cowie, Martin R.; Blomster, Juuso I.; Curtis, Lesley H.; Duclaux, Sylvie; Ford, Ian; Fritz, Fleur; Goldman, Samantha; Janmohamed, Salim; Kreuzer, J?rg; Leenay, Mark; Michel, Alexander; Ong, Seleen; Pell, Jill P.; Southworth, Mary Ross; Stough, Wendy Gattis

    2016-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) provide opportunities to enhance patient care, embed performance measures in clinical practice, and facilitate clinical research. Concerns have been raised about the increasing recruitment challenges in trials, burdensome and obtrusive data collection, and uncertain generalizability of the results. Leveraging electronic health records to counterbalance these trends is an area of intense interest. The initial applications of electronic health records, as the pr...

  6. Organ Procurement Organizations and the Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Howard, R J; Cochran, L D; Cornell, D L

    2015-10-01

    The adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) has adversely affected the ability of organ procurement organizations (OPOs) to perform their federally mandated function of honoring the donation decisions of families and donors who have signed the registry. The difficulties gaining access to potential donor medical record has meant that assessment, evaluation, and management of brain dead organ donors has become much more difficult. Delays can occur that can lead to potential recipients not receiving life-saving organs. For over 40 years, OPO personnel have had ready access to paper medical records. But the widespread adoption of EHRs has greatly limited the ability of OPO coordinators to readily gain access to patient medical records and to manage brain dead donors. Proposed solutions include the following: (1) hospitals could provide limited access to OPO personnel so that they could see only the potential donor's medical record; (2) OPOs could join with other transplant organizations to inform regulators of the problem; and (3) hospital organizations could be approached to work with Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to revise the Hospital Conditions of Participation to require OPOs be given access to donor medical records. © Copyright 2015 The American Society of Transplantation and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons.

  7. Health record systems that meet clinical needs

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Gabriella Negrini

    2012-10-01

    Full Text Available Introduction Increased attention has recently been focused on health record systems as a result of accreditation programs, a growing emphasis on patient safety, and the increase in lawsuits involving allegations of malpractice. Health-care professionals frequently express dissatisfaction with the health record systems and complain that the data included are neither informative nor useful for clinical decision making. This article reviews the main objectives of a hospital health record system, with emphasis on its roles in communication and exchange among clinicians, patient safety, and continuity of care, and asks whether current systems have responded to the recent changes in the Italian health-care system.Discussion If health records are to meet the expectations of all health professionals, the overall information need must be carefully analyzed, a common data set must be created, and essential specialist contributions must be defined. Working with health-care professionals, the hospital management should define how clinical information is to be displayed and organized, identify a functionally optimal layout, define the characteristics of ongoing patient assessment in terms of who will be responsible for these activities and how often they will be performed. Internet technology can facilitate data retrieval and meet the general requirements of a paper-based health record system, but it must also ensure focus on clinical information, business continuity, integrity, security, and privacy.Conclusions The current health records system needs to be thoroughly revised to increase its accessibility, streamline the work of health-care professionals who consult it, and render it more useful for clinical decision making—a challenging task that will require the active involvement of the many professional classes involved.

  8. Fear of e-Health records implementation?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Laur, Audrey

    2015-03-01

    As our world is dominated by Information Communication and Technologies (ICT), governments of many leading countries have decided to implement ICT in their health systems. The first step is the digitalisation of medical records (e-Health Records or EHRs). In order to reduce concerns that health systems encountered, EHRs are supposed to prevent duplicated prescriptions and hospitalisations, ineffective transferability of medical records, lack of communication in clinical assessments, etc. They are also expected to improve the relationship between health providers and patients. At first sight, EHR seems to offer considerable potential for assisting health policies, enabling the development of new tools to facilitate coordination and cooperation among health professionals and promoting a new approach to sharing medical information. However, as discussed in this article, recent debates have shown that EHR presents pros and cons (technical, financial, social) that governments need to clarify urgently. © The Author(s) 2014 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav.

  9. Electronic Health Records: PHR Opportunities for Public Health – Part 2

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2009-09-10

    In this podcast, Dr. Ken Mandl discusses electronic health records and personally-controlled health records. Dr. Mandl leads the IndivoHealth personally-controlled health record project, the original reference model for the Microsoft, Google, and Dossia personal health records (PHRs or PCHRs). He has successfully used PHRs for immunization and influenza, leads efforts in real-time surveillance systems, and is currently adapting personal health records for longitudinal and genomic research. The lecture was given at CDC on June 19, 2009.  Created: 9/10/2009 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service (CCHIS), Healthy Healthcare Settings Goal Team, Office of Strategy and Innovation.   Date Released: 6/3/2010.

  10. Electronic Health Records: PHR Opportunities for Public Health – Part 1

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2009-09-10

    In this podcast, Dr. Ken Mandl discusses electronic health records and personally-controlled health records. Dr. Mandl leads the IndivoHealth personally-controlled health record project, the original reference model for the Microsoft, Google, and Dossia personal health records (PHRs or PCHRs). He has successfully used PHRs for immunization and influenza, leads efforts in real-time surveillance systems, and is currently adapting personal health records for longitudinal and genomic research. The lecture was given at CDC on June 19, 2009.  Created: 9/10/2009 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service (CCHIS), Healthy Healthcare Settings Goal Team, Office of Strategy and Innovation.   Date Released: 6/3/2010.

  11. Do electronic health records affect the patient-psychiatrist relationship? A before & after study of psychiatric outpatients

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Schuyler Mark

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background A growing body of literature shows that patients accept the use of computers in clinical care. Nonetheless, studies have shown that computers unequivocally change both verbal and non-verbal communication style and increase patients' concerns about the privacy of their records. We found no studies which evaluated the use of Electronic Health Records (EHRs specifically on psychiatric patient satisfaction, nor any that took place exclusively in a psychiatric treatment setting. Due to the special reliance on communication for psychiatric diagnosis and evaluation, and the emphasis on confidentiality of psychiatric records, the results of previous studies may not apply equally to psychiatric patients. Method We examined the association between EHR use and changes to the patient-psychiatrist relationship. A patient satisfaction survey was administered to psychiatric patient volunteers prior to and following implementation of an EHR. All subjects were adult outpatients with chronic mental illness. Results Survey responses were grouped into categories of "Overall," "Technical," "Interpersonal," "Communication & Education,," "Time," "Confidentiality," "Anxiety," and "Computer Use." Multiple, unpaired, two-tailed t-tests comparing pre- and post-implementation groups showed no significant differences (at the 0.05 level to any questionnaire category for all subjects combined or when subjects were stratified by primary diagnosis category. Conclusions While many barriers to the adoption of electronic health records do exist, concerns about disruption to the patient-psychiatrist relationship need not be a prominent focus. Attention to communication style, interpersonal manner, and computer proficiency may help maintain the quality of the patient-psychiatrist relationship following EHR implementation.

  12. Evaluating Motivation for the Use of an Electronic Health Record Simulation Game.

    Science.gov (United States)

    McLeod, Alexander; Hewitt, Barbara; Gibbs, David; Kristof, Caitlin

    2017-01-01

    Experiential learning via simulation offers a variety of benefits including reduced risks, repetitive exposure, and mastery of complex processes. How to motivate people to engage in and enjoy playing games is an important concept in the creation of serious games focused on learning new skills. This study sought to determine the motivators that increase users' pleasurable experience when playing an electronic health record simulation game. To examine how intrinsic and extrinsic motivation affected both engagement and enjoyment, we surveyed students of health professions at one university. Results indicate that while both forms of motivation are significant in increasing engagement and enjoyment, extrinsic motivation such as badges, points, and scoreboards were much more important than internal motivations for our participants. These findings have implications for the development of an electronic health record simulation game.

  13. Electronic Health Record Implementation: A SWOT Analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shahmoradi, Leila; Darrudi, Alireza; Arji, Goli; Farzaneh Nejad, Ahmadreza

    2017-10-01

    Electronic Health Record (EHR) is one of the most important achievements of information technology in healthcare domain, and if deployed effectively, it can yield predominant results. The aim of this study was a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis in electronic health record implementation. This is a descriptive, analytical study conducted with the participation of a 90-member work force from Hospitals affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS). The data were collected by using a self-structured questionnaire and analyzed by SPSS software. Based on the results, the highest priority in strength analysis was related to timely and quick access to information. However, lack of hardware and infrastructures was the most important weakness. Having the potential to share information between different sectors and access to a variety of health statistics was the significant opportunity of EHR. Finally, the most substantial threats were the lack of strategic planning in the field of electronic health records together with physicians' and other clinical staff's resistance in the use of electronic health records. To facilitate successful adoption of electronic health record, some organizational, technical and resource elements contribute; moreover, the consideration of these factors is essential for HER implementation.

  14. Integration of clinical research documentation in electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Broach, Debra

    2015-04-01

    Clinical trials of investigational drugs and devices are often conducted within healthcare facilities concurrently with clinical care. With implementation of electronic health records, new communication methods are required to notify nonresearch clinicians of research participation. This article reviews clinical research source documentation, the electronic health record and the medical record, areas in which the research record and electronic health record overlap, and implications for the research nurse coordinator in documentation of the care of the patient/subject. Incorporation of clinical research documentation in the electronic health record will lead to a more complete patient/subject medical record in compliance with both research and medical records regulations. A literature search provided little information about the inclusion of clinical research documentation within the electronic health record. Although regulations and guidelines define both source documentation and the medical record, integration of research documentation in the electronic health record is not clearly defined. At minimum, the signed informed consent(s), investigational drug or device usage, and research team contact information should be documented within the electronic health record. Institutional policies should define a standardized process for this integration in the absence federal guidance. Nurses coordinating clinical trials are in an ideal position to define this integration.

  15. VA Personal Health Record Sample Data

    Data.gov (United States)

    Department of Veterans Affairs — My HealtheVet (www.myhealth.va.gov) is a Personal Health Record portal designed to improve the delivery of health care services to Veterans, to promote health and...

  16. Evaluation of Electronic Health Record Implementation in Hospitals.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tubaishat, Ahmad

    2017-07-01

    The effectiveness of electronic health records has not previously been widely evaluated. Thus, this national cross-sectional study was conducted to evaluate electronic health records, from the perspective of nurses, by examining how they use the records, their opinions on the quality of the systems, and their overall levels of satisfaction with electronic health records. The relationship between these constructs was measured, and its predictors were investigated. A random sample of Jordanian hospitals that used electronic health records was selected, and data were gathered using a self-administered questionnaire, based on the DeLone and McLean Information Systems Success model. In total, 1648 nurses from 17 different hospitals participated in the study. Results indicated that nurses were largely positive about the use and quality of the systems and were satisfied with electronic health records. Significant positive correlations were found between these constructs, and a number of demographical and situational factors were found to have an effect on nurses' perceptions. The study provides a systematic evaluation of different facets of electronic health records, which is fundamental for recognizing the motives and challenges for success and for further enhancing this success. The work proves that nurses favor the use of electronic health records and are satisfied with it and perceive its high quality, and the findings should therefore encourage their ongoing implementation.

  17. Teaching Electronic Health Record Communication Skills.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Palumbo, Mary Val; Sandoval, Marie; Hart, Vicki; Drill, Clarissa

    2016-06-01

    This pilot study investigated nurse practitioner students' communication skills when utilizing the electronic health record during history taking. The nurse practitioner students (n = 16) were videotaped utilizing the electronic health record while taking health histories with standardized patients. The students were videotaped during two separate sessions during one semester. Two observers recorded the time spent (1) typing and talking, (2) typing only, and (3) looking at the computer without talking. Total history taking time, computer placement, and communication skills were also recorded. During the formative session, mean history taking time was 11.4 minutes, with 3.5 minutes engaged with the computer (30.6% of visit). During the evaluative session, mean history taking time was 12.4 minutes, with 2.95 minutes engaged with the computer (24% of visit). The percentage of time individuals spent changed over the two visits: typing and talking, -3.1% (P = .3); typing only, +12.8% (P = .038); and looking at the computer, -9.6% (P = .039). This study demonstrated that time spent engaged with the computer during a patient encounter does decrease with student practice and education. Therefore, students benefit from instruction on electronic health record-specific communication skills, and use of a simple mnemonic to reinforce this is suggested.

  18. Affective health bias in older adults: Considering positive and negative affect in a general health context.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Whitehead, Brenda R; Bergeman, C S

    2016-09-01

    Because subjective health reports are a primary source of health information in a number of medical and research-based contexts, much research has been devoted to establishing the extent to which these self-reports of health correspond to health information from more objective sources. One of the key factors considered in this area is trait affect, with most studies emphasizing the impact of negative affect (negative emotions) over positive affect (positive emotions), and focusing on high-arousal affect (e.g., anger, excitement) over moderate- or low-arousal affect (e.g., relaxed, depressed). The present study examines the impact of both Positive and Negative Affect (PA/NA)-measured by items of both high and low arousal-on the correspondence between objective health information and subjective health reports. Another limitation of existing literature in the area is the focus on samples suffering from a particular diagnosis or on specific symptom reports; here, these effects are investigated in a sample of community-dwelling older adults representing a broader spectrum of health. 153 older adults (Mage = 71.2) took surveys assessing Perceived Health and Affect and underwent an objective physical health assessment. Structural equation modeling was used to investigate the extent to which the relationship between Objective Health and Perceived Health was moderated by PA or NA, which would indicate the presence of affective health bias. Results reveal a significant moderation effect for NA, but not for PA; PA appeared to serve a more mediational function, indicating that NA and PA operate on health perceptions in distinct ways. These findings provide evidence that in our high-functioning, community-dwelling sample of older adults, a) affective health bias is present within a general health context, and not only within specific symptom or diagnostic categories; and b) that both PA and NA play important roles in the process. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights

  19. Electronic Health Record Implementation: A SWOT Analysis

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Leila Shahmoradi

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available Electronic Health Record (EHR is one of the most important achievements of information technology in healthcare domain, and if deployed effectively, it can yield predominant results. The aim of this study was a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats analysis in electronic health record implementation. This is a descriptive, analytical study conducted with the participation of a 90-member work force from Hospitals affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS. The data were collected by using a self-structured questionnaire and analyzed by SPSS software. Based on the results, the highest priority in strength analysis was related to timely and quick access to information. However, lack of hardware and infrastructures was the most important weakness. Having the potential to share information between different sectors and access to a variety of health statistics was the significant opportunity of EHR. Finally, the most substantial threats were the lack of strategic planning in the field of electronic health records together with physicians’ and other clinical staff’s resistance in the use of electronic health records. To facilitate successful adoption of electronic health record, some organizational, technical and resource elements contribute; moreover, the consideration of these factors is essential for HER implementation.

  20. Security Techniques for the Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kruse, Clemens Scott; Smith, Brenna; Vanderlinden, Hannah; Nealand, Alexandra

    2017-08-01

    The privacy of patients and the security of their information is the most imperative barrier to entry when considering the adoption of electronic health records in the healthcare industry. Considering current legal regulations, this review seeks to analyze and discuss prominent security techniques for healthcare organizations seeking to adopt a secure electronic health records system. Additionally, the researchers sought to establish a foundation for further research for security in the healthcare industry. The researchers utilized the Texas State University Library to gain access to three online databases: PubMed (MEDLINE), CINAHL, and ProQuest Nursing and Allied Health Source. These sources were used to conduct searches on literature concerning security of electronic health records containing several inclusion and exclusion criteria. Researchers collected and analyzed 25 journals and reviews discussing security of electronic health records, 20 of which mentioned specific security methods and techniques. The most frequently mentioned security measures and techniques are categorized into three themes: administrative, physical, and technical safeguards. The sensitive nature of the information contained within electronic health records has prompted the need for advanced security techniques that are able to put these worries at ease. It is imperative for security techniques to cover the vast threats that are present across the three pillars of healthcare.

  1. Towards lifetime electronic health record implementation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gand, Kai; Richter, Peggy; Esswein, Werner

    2015-01-01

    Integrated care concepts can help to diminish demographic challenges. Hereof, the use of eHealth, esp. overarching electronic health records, is recognized as an efficient approach. The article aims at rigorously defining the concept of lifetime electronic health records (LEHRs) and the identification of core factors that need to be fulfilled in order to implement such. A literature review was conducted. Existing definitions were identified and relevant factors were categorized. The derived assessment categories are demonstrated by a case study on Germany. Seven dimensions to differentiate types of electronic health records were found. The analysis revealed, that culture, regulation, informational self-determination, incentives, compliance, ICT infrastructure and standards are important preconditions to successfully implement LEHRs. The article paves the way for LEHR implementation and therewith for integrated care. Besides the expected benefits of LEHRs, there are a number of ethical, legal and social concerns, which need to be balanced.

  2. The Future Is Coming: Electronic Health Records

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Current Issue Past Issues The Future Is Coming: Electronic Health Records Past Issues / Spring 2009 Table of Contents For ... special conference on the cutting-edge topic of electronic health records (EHR) on May 20-21, 2009, on the ...

  3. Validation of asthma recording in electronic health records: a systematic review

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nissen F

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available Francis Nissen,1 Jennifer K Quint,2 Samantha Wilkinson,1 Hana Mullerova,3 Liam Smeeth,1 Ian J Douglas1 1Department of Non-Communicable Disease Epidemiology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK; 2National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College, London, UK; 3RWD & Epidemiology, GSK R&D, Uxbridge, UK Objective: To describe the methods used to validate asthma diagnoses in electronic health records and summarize the results of the validation studies. Background: Electronic health records are increasingly being used for research on asthma to inform health services and health policy. Validation of the recording of asthma diagnoses in electronic health records is essential to use these databases for credible epidemiological asthma research.Methods: We searched EMBASE and MEDLINE databases for studies that validated asthma diagnoses detected in electronic health records up to October 2016. Two reviewers independently assessed the full text against the predetermined inclusion criteria. Key data including author, year, data source, case definitions, reference standard, and validation statistics (including sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value [PPV], and negative predictive value [NPV] were summarized in two tables.Results: Thirteen studies met the inclusion criteria. Most studies demonstrated a high validity using at least one case definition (PPV >80%. Ten studies used a manual validation as the reference standard; each had at least one case definition with a PPV of at least 63%, up to 100%. We also found two studies using a second independent database to validate asthma diagnoses. The PPVs of the best performing case definitions ranged from 46% to 58%. We found one study which used a questionnaire as the reference standard to validate a database case definition; the PPV of the case definition algorithm in this study was 89%. Conclusion: Attaining high PPVs (>80% is possible using each of the discussed validation

  4. Requesting a unique personal identifier or providing a souvenir incentive did not affect overall consent to health record linkage: evidence from an RCT nested within a cohort.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ni, Michael Y; Li, Tom K; Hui, Rex W H; McDowell, Ian; Leung, Gabriel M

    2017-04-01

    It is unclear if unique personal identifiers should be requested from participants for health record linkage: this permits high-quality data linkage but at the potential cost of lower consent rates due to privacy concerns. Drawing from a sampling frame based on the FAMILY Cohort, using a 2 × 2 factorial design, we randomly assigned 1,200 participants to (1) request for Hong Kong Identity Card number (HKID) or no request and (2) receiving a souvenir incentive (valued at USD4) or no incentive. The primary outcome was consent to health record linkage. We also investigated associations between demographics, health status, and postal reminders with consent. Overall, we received signed consent forms from 33.3% (95% confidence interval [CI] 30.6-36.0%) of respondents. We did not find an overall effect of requesting HKID (-4.3%, 95% CI -9.8% to 1.2%) or offering souvenir incentives (2.4%, 95% CI -3.1% to 7.9%) on consent to linkage. In subgroup analyses, requesting HKID significantly reduced consent among adults aged 18-44 years (odds ratio [OR] 0.53, 95% CI 0.30-0.94, compared to no request). Souvenir incentives increased consent among women (OR 1.55, 95% CI 1.13-2.11, compared to no souvenirs). Requesting a unique personal identifier or providing a souvenir incentive did not affect overall consent to health record linkage. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  5. Implementation of Electronic Health Records in US Nursing Homes.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bjarnadottir, Ragnhildur I; Herzig, Carolyn T A; Travers, Jasmine L; Castle, Nicholas G; Stone, Patricia W

    2017-08-01

    While electronic health records have emerged as promising tools to help improve quality of care, nursing homes have lagged behind in implementation. This study assessed electronic health records implementation, associated facility characteristics, and potential impact on quality indicators in nursing homes. Using national Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and survey data for nursing homes, a cross-sectional analysis was conducted to identify variations between nursing homes that had and had not implemented electronic health records. A difference-in-differences analysis was used to estimate the longitudinal effect of electronic health records on commonly used quality indicators. Data from 927 nursing homes were examined, 49.1% of which had implemented electronic health records. Nursing homes with electronic health records were more likely to be nonprofit/government owned (P = .04) and had a lower percentage of Medicaid residents (P = .02) and higher certified nursing assistant and registered nurse staffing levels (P = .002 and .02, respectively). Difference-in-differences analysis showed greater quality improvements after implementation for five long-stay and two short-stay quality measures (P = .001 and .01, respectively) compared with those who did not implement electronic health records. Implementation rates in nursing homes are low compared with other settings, and better-resourced facilities are more likely to have implemented electronic health records. Consistent with other settings, electronic health records implementation improves quality in nursing homes, but further research is needed to better understand the mechanism for improvement and how it can best be supported.

  6. Deploying Electronic Health Record

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    SOFTLINKS DIGITAL

    [11] Verisign Whitepaper (2005) Managing Application Security in Business ... health record (EHR) and Information Technology and the subsequent impact of ... advancements, said that IT must play a ... and history of medical status and other.

  7. Quality and Electronic Health Records in Community Health Centers

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lesh, Kathryn A.

    2014-01-01

    Adoption and use of health information technology, the electronic health record (EHR) in particular, has the potential to help improve the quality of care, increase patient safety, and reduce health care costs. Unfortunately, adoption and use of health information technology has been slow, especially when compared to the adoption and use of…

  8. Possible Sources of Bias in Primary Care Electronic Health Record Data Use and Reuse.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Verheij, Robert A; Curcin, Vasa; Delaney, Brendan C; McGilchrist, Mark M

    2018-05-29

    Enormous amounts of data are recorded routinely in health care as part of the care process, primarily for managing individual patient care. There are significant opportunities to use these data for other purposes, many of which would contribute to establishing a learning health system. This is particularly true for data recorded in primary care settings, as in many countries, these are the first place patients turn to for most health problems. In this paper, we discuss whether data that are recorded routinely as part of the health care process in primary care are actually fit to use for other purposes such as research and quality of health care indicators, how the original purpose may affect the extent to which the data are fit for another purpose, and the mechanisms behind these effects. In doing so, we want to identify possible sources of bias that are relevant for the use and reuse of these type of data. This paper is based on the authors' experience as users of electronic health records data, as general practitioners, health informatics experts, and health services researchers. It is a product of the discussions they had during the Translational Research and Patient Safety in Europe (TRANSFoRm) project, which was funded by the European Commission and sought to develop, pilot, and evaluate a core information architecture for the learning health system in Europe, based on primary care electronic health records. We first describe the different stages in the processing of electronic health record data, as well as the different purposes for which these data are used. Given the different data processing steps and purposes, we then discuss the possible mechanisms for each individual data processing step that can generate biased outcomes. We identified 13 possible sources of bias. Four of them are related to the organization of a health care system, whereas some are of a more technical nature. There are a substantial number of possible sources of bias; very little is

  9. Health Data Recording, Reporting and Utilization Practices Among ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Health Data Recording, Reporting and Utilization Practices Among Primary Health Care Workers in Enugu State, South Eastern Nigeria. ... of PHC workers used notepads, 52.3% used notebooks while only 47.7% used health management information system (HMIS) forms to record data. ... AJOL African Journals Online.

  10. Linking Health Records for Federated Query Processing

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dewri Rinku

    2016-07-01

    Full Text Available A federated query portal in an electronic health record infrastructure enables large epidemiology studies by combining data from geographically dispersed medical institutions. However, an individual’s health record has been found to be distributed across multiple carrier databases in local settings. Privacy regulations may prohibit a data source from revealing clear text identifiers, thereby making it non-trivial for a query aggregator to determine which records correspond to the same underlying individual. In this paper, we explore this problem of privately detecting and tracking the health records of an individual in a distributed infrastructure. We begin with a secure set intersection protocol based on commutative encryption, and show how to make it practical on comparison spaces as large as 1010 pairs. Using bigram matching, precomputed tables, and data parallelism, we successfully reduced the execution time to a matter of minutes, while retaining a high degree of accuracy even in records with data entry errors. We also propose techniques to prevent the inference of identifier information when knowledge of underlying data distributions is known to an adversary. Finally, we discuss how records can be tracked utilizing the detection results during query processing.

  11. Effectiveness Of Security Controls On Electronic Health Records

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Everleen Wanyonyi

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available Electronic Health Record EHR systems enhance efficiency and effectiveness in handling patients information in healthcare. This study focused on the EHR security by initially establishing the nature of threats affecting the system and reviewing the implemented security safeguards. The study was done at a referral hospital level 6 government facility in Kenya. Purposive sampling was used to select a sample of 196 out of 385 staff and a questionnaire designed for qualitative data collection. Data was analyzed using SPSS software. Correlations and binary logistic regression were obtained. Binary Logistic Regression BLR was used to establish the effect of the safeguards predictors on EHR security. It was established that physical security contributes more to the security of an information system than administrative controls and technical controls in that order. BLR helped in predicting effective safeguards to control EHR security threats in limited resourced public health facilities.

  12. Electronic Health Record in Continuous Shared Health Care

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hanzlíček, Petr; Zvárová, Jana; Zvára, K.; Bureš, V.; Špidlen, Josef

    2005-01-01

    Roč. 11, - (2005), s. 1-6 ISSN 1727-1983. [EMBEC'05. European Medical and Biomedical Conference /3./. Prague, 20.11.2005-25.11.2005] R&D Projects: GA AV ČR 1ET200300413 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * shared health care * information technology Subject RIV: BD - Theory of Information

  13. Personal health records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kensing, Finn

    2012-01-01

    The paper addresses the complex interplay between patients, healthcare professionals, and technology in relation to the treatment of chronic patients. It reflects on an ongoing interdisciplinary action research project striving to design and implement IT support for communication and collaboration...... in the distributed heterogeneous network of chronic patients and the healthcare professionals that take care of them. An interactive personal health record (PHR) has been designed as part of the project. As such it is part of a trend to find ways to include patients in their own care process. This has been motivated...... by expected health benefits for the patients as well as promises to lead to reduced costs for a burdened healthcare system....

  14. Electronic health record standards, coding systems, frameworks, and infrastructures

    CERN Document Server

    Sinha, Pradeep K; Bendale, Prashant; Mantri, Manisha; Dande, Atreya

    2013-01-01

    Discover How Electronic Health Records Are Built to Drive the Next Generation of Healthcare Delivery The increased role of IT in the healthcare sector has led to the coining of a new phrase ""health informatics,"" which deals with the use of IT for better healthcare services. Health informatics applications often involve maintaining the health records of individuals, in digital form, which is referred to as an Electronic Health Record (EHR). Building and implementing an EHR infrastructure requires an understanding of healthcare standards, coding systems, and frameworks. This book provides an

  15. Are electronic health records ready for genomic medicine?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Scheuner, Maren T; de Vries, Han; Kim, Benjamin; Meili, Robin C; Olmstead, Sarah H; Teleki, Stephanie

    2009-07-01

    The goal of this project was to assess genetic/genomic content in electronic health records. Semistructured interviews were conducted with key informants. Questions addressed documentation, organization, display, decision support and security of family history and genetic test information, and challenges and opportunities relating to integrating genetic/genomics content in electronic health records. There were 56 participants: 10 electronic health record specialists, 18 primary care clinicians, 16 medical geneticists, and 12 genetic counselors. Few clinicians felt their electronic record met their current genetic/genomic medicine needs. Barriers to integration were mostly related to problems with family history data collection, documentation, and organization. Lack of demand for genetics content and privacy concerns were also mentioned as challenges. Data elements and functionality requirements that clinicians see include: pedigree drawing; clinical decision support for familial risk assessment and genetic testing indications; a patient portal for patient-entered data; and standards for data elements, terminology, structure, interoperability, and clinical decision support rules. Although most said that there is little impact of genetics/genomics on electronic records today, many stated genetics/genomics would be a driver of content in the next 5-10 years. Electronic health records have the potential to enable clinical integration of genetic/genomic medicine and improve delivery of personalized health care; however, structured and standardized data elements and functionality requirements are needed.

  16. Use of Electronic Health Records and Administrative Data for Public Health Surveillance of Eye Health and Vision-Related Conditions

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elliott, Amanda; Davidson, Arthur; Lum, Flora; Chiang, Michael; Saaddine, Jinan B; Zhang, Xinzhi; Crews, John E.; Chou, Chiu-Fang

    2014-01-01

    Purpose To discuss the current trend toward greater use of electronic health records and how these records could enhance public health surveillance of eye health and vision-related conditions. Methods We describe three currently available sources of electronic health data (Kaiser Permanente, the Veterans Health Administration, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) and how these sources can contribute to a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system. Results Each of the three sources of electronic health data can contribute meaningfully to a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system, but none currently provide all the information required. The use of electronic health records for vision and eye health surveillance has both advantages and disadvantages. Conclusions Electronic health records may provide additional information needed to create a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system. Recommendations for incorporating electronic health records into such a system are presented. PMID:23158225

  17. Healthcare technology innovation adoption electronic health records and other emerging health information technology innovations

    CERN Document Server

    Daim, Tugrul U; Basoglu, Nuri; Kök, Orhun M; Hogaboam, Liliya

    2016-01-01

    This book aims to study the factors affecting the adoption and diffusion of Health Information Technology (HIT) innovation. It analyzes the adoption processes of various tools and applications, particularly Electronic Health Records (EHR), highlighting the impact on various sectors of the healthcare system, such as physicians, administration,  and patient care, while also identifying the various pitfalls and gaps in the literature. With the various challenges currently facing the United States healthcare system, the study, adoption and diffusion of healthcare technology innovation, particularly HIT, is imperative to achieving national goals. This book is organized into three sections. Section one reviews theories and applications for the diffusion of Health Care Technologies. Section two evaluates EHR technology, including the barriers and enables in adoption and alternative technologies. Finally, section three examines the factors impacting the adoption of EHR systems. This book will be a key source for stu...

  18. Operating Room Delays: Meaningful Use in Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Van Winkle, Rachelle A; Champagne, Mary T; Gilman-Mays, Meri; Aucoin, Julia

    2016-06-01

    Perioperative areas are the most costly to operate and account for more than 40% of expenses. The high costs prompted one organization to analyze surgical delays through a retrospective review of their new electronic health record. Electronic health records have made it easier to access and aggregate clinical data; 2123 operating room cases were analyzed. Implementing a new electronic health record system is complex; inaccurate data and poor implementation can introduce new problems. Validating the electronic health record development processes determines the ease of use and the user interface, specifically related to user compliance with the intent of the electronic health record development. The revalidation process after implementation determines if the intent of the design was fulfilled and data can be meaningfully used. In this organization, the data fields completed through automation provided quantifiable, meaningful data. However, data fields completed by staff that required subjective decision making resulted in incomplete data nearly 24% of the time. The ease of use was further complicated by 490 permutations (combinations of delay types and reasons) that were built into the electronic health record. Operating room delay themes emerged notwithstanding the significant complexity of the electronic health record build; however, improved accuracy could improve meaningful data collection and a more accurate root cause analysis of operating room delays. Accurate and meaningful use of data affords a more reliable approach in quality, safety, and cost-effective initiatives.

  19. Electronic Health Record Meets Digital Library

    Science.gov (United States)

    Humphreys, Betsy L.

    2000-01-01

    Linking the electronic health record to the digital library is a Web-era reformulation of the long-standing informatics goal of seamless integration of automated clinical data and relevant knowledge-based information to support informed decisions. The spread of the Internet, the development of the World Wide Web, and converging format standards for electronic health data and digital publications make effective linking increasingly feasible. Some existing systems link electronic health data and knowledge-based information in limited settings or limited ways. Yet many challenging informatics research problems remain to be solved before flexible and seamless linking becomes a reality and before systems become capable of delivering the specific piece of information needed at the time and place a decision must be made. Connecting the electronic health record to the digital library also requires positive resolution of important policy issues, including health data privacy, government envouragement of high-speed communications, electronic intellectual property rights, and standards for health data and for digital libraries. Both the research problems and the policy issues should be important priorities for the field of medical informatics. PMID:10984463

  20. The military health system's personal health record pilot with Microsoft HealthVault and Google Health.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Do, Nhan V; Barnhill, Rick; Heermann-Do, Kimberly A; Salzman, Keith L; Gimbel, Ronald W

    2011-01-01

    To design, build, implement, and evaluate a personal health record (PHR), tethered to the Military Health System, that leverages Microsoft® HealthVault and Google® Health infrastructure based on user preference. A pilot project was conducted in 2008-2009 at Madigan Army Medical Center in Tacoma, Washington. Our PHR was architected to a flexible platform that incorporated standards-based models of Continuity of Document and Continuity of Care Record to map Department of Defense-sourced health data, via a secure Veterans Administration data broker, to Microsoft® HealthVault and Google® Health based on user preference. The project design and implementation were guided by provider and patient advisory panels with formal user evaluation. The pilot project included 250 beneficiary users. Approximately 73.2% of users were Microsoft® HealthVault, and 81 (32.4%) selected Google® Health as their PHR of preference. Sample evaluation of users reflected 100% (n = 60) satisfied with convenience of record access and 91.7% (n = 55) satisfied with overall functionality of PHR. Key lessons learned related to data-transfer decisions (push vs pull), purposeful delays in reporting sensitive information, understanding and mapping PHR use and clinical workflow, and decisions on information patients may choose to share with their provider. Currently PHRs are being viewed as empowering tools for patient activation. Design and implementation issues (eg, technical, organizational, information security) are substantial and must be thoughtfully approached. Adopting standards into design can enhance the national goal of portability and interoperability.

  1. The Relationship between Self-rated Health and Hospital Records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Nielsen, Torben Heien

    hospital records. I use both measures separately to control for health in a regression of mortality on wealth. Using only historical and current hospitalization controls for health yields the common result, that SRH is a stronger predictor of mortality than objective health measures. The addition of future...... hospitalizations as controls shows that the estimated gradient on wealth is similar to one in which SRH is the control. The results suggest that SRH is able to capture diseases at prodromal stages and that with a sufficiently long time series of individual records, objective health measures can predict mortality......This paper investigates whether self-rated health (SRH) co-varies with individual hospital records. By linking the Danish Longitudinal Survey on Aging with individual hospital records covering all hospital admissions from 1995-2006, I show that SRH is correlated to historical, current, and future...

  2. The Relationship between Self-Rated Health and Hospital Records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Nielsen, Torben Heien

    2013-01-01

    hospital records. I use both measures separately to control for health in a regression of mortality on wealth. Using only historical and current hospitalization controls for health yields the common result, that SRH is a stronger predictor of mortality than objective health measures. The addition of future...... hospitalizations as controls shows that the estimated gradient on wealth is similar to one in which SRH is the control. The results suggest that SRH is able to capture diseases at prodromal stages and that with a sufficiently long time series ofindividual records, objective health measures can predict mortality......This paper investigates whether self-rated health (SRH) co-varies with individual hospital records. By linking the Danish Longitudinal Survey on Aging with individual hospital records covering all hospital admissions from 1995-2006, I show that SRH is correlated to historical, current, and future...

  3. The Relationship between Self-rated Health and Hospital Records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Nielsen, Torben Heien

    2016-01-01

    , and future hospital records. I use both measures separately to control for health in a regression of mortality on wealth. Using only historical and current hospitalization controls for health yields the common result that SRH is a stronger predictor of mortality than objective health measures. The addition...... of future hospitalizations as controls shows that the estimated gradient on wealth is similar to one in which SRH is the control. The results suggest that with a sufficiently long time series of individual records, objective health measures can predict mortality to the same extent as global self......This paper investigates whether self-rated health (SRH) covaries with individual hospital records. By linking the Danish Longitudinal Survey on Ageing with individual hospital records covering all hospital admissions from 1995 to 2006, I show that SRH is correlated to historical, current...

  4. Technology as friend or foe? Do electronic health records increase burnout?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ehrenfeld, Jesse M; Wanderer, Jonathan P

    2018-06-01

    To summarize recent relevant studies regarding the use of electronic health records and physician burnout. Recently acquired knowledge regarding the relationship between electronic health record use, professional satisfaction, burnout, and desire to leave clinical practice are discussed. Adoption of electronic health records has increased across the United States and worldwide. Although electronic health records have many benefits, there is growing concern about the adverse consequences of their use on physician satisfaction and burnout. Poor usability, incongruent workflows, and the addition of clerical tasks to physician documentation requirements have been previously highlighted as ongoing concerns with electronic health record adoption. In multiple recent studies, electronic health records have been shown to decrease professional satisfaction, increase burnout, and the likelihood that a physician will reduce or leave clinical practice. One interventional study demonstrated a positive effect of a dedicated electronic health record entry clerk on physicians working in an outpatient practice.

  5. Personal health records: retrieving contextual information with Google Custom Search.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ahsan, Mahmud; Seldon, H Lee; Sayeed, Shohel

    2012-01-01

    Ubiquitous personal health records, which can accompany a person everywhere, are a necessary requirement for ubiquitous healthcare. Contextual information related to health events is important for the diagnosis and treatment of disease and for the maintenance of good health, yet it is seldom recorded in a health record. We describe a dual cellphone-and-Web-based personal health record system which can include 'external' contextual information. Much contextual information is available on the Internet and we can use ontologies to help identify relevant sites and information. But a search engine is required to retrieve information from the Web and developing a customized search engine is beyond our scope, so we can use Google Custom Search API Web service to get contextual data. In this paper we describe a framework which combines a health-and-environment 'knowledge base' or ontology with the Google Custom Search API to retrieve relevant contextual information related to entries in a ubiquitous personal health record.

  6. Confidentiality Protection of Digital Health Records in Cloud Computing.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chen, Shyh-Wei; Chiang, Dai Lun; Liu, Chia-Hui; Chen, Tzer-Shyong; Lai, Feipei; Wang, Huihui; Wei, Wei

    2016-05-01

    Electronic medical records containing confidential information were uploaded to the cloud. The cloud allows medical crews to access and manage the data and integration of medical records easily. This data system provides relevant information to medical personnel and facilitates and improve electronic medical record management and data transmission. A structure of cloud-based and patient-centered personal health record (PHR) is proposed in this study. This technique helps patients to manage their health information, such as appointment date with doctor, health reports, and a completed understanding of their own health conditions. It will create patients a positive attitudes to maintain the health. The patients make decision on their own for those whom has access to their records over a specific span of time specified by the patients. Storing data in the cloud environment can reduce costs and enhance the share of information, but the potential threat of information security should be taken into consideration. This study is proposing the cloud-based secure transmission mechanism is suitable for multiple users (like nurse aides, patients, and family members).

  7. Electronic Health Record for Continuous Shared Health Care

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hanzlíček, Petr; Zvárová, Jana

    2005-01-01

    Roč. 9, - (2005), s. 275-280 ISSN 1335-2393. [YBERC 2005. Young Biomedical Engineers and Researchers Conference. Stará Lesná, 13.07.2005-15.07.2005] R&D Projects: GA AV ČR 1ET200300413 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : information society * telemedicine * electronic health record * digital signature * personal data protection * biomedical informatics Subject RIV: FQ - Public Health Care, Social Medicine

  8. Mandatory Use of Electronic Health Records: Overcoming Physician Resistance

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Viseeta K.

    2012-01-01

    Literature supports the idea that electronic health records hold tremendous value for the healthcare system in that it increases patient safety, improves the quality of care and provides greater efficiency. The move toward mandatory implementation of electronic health records is a growing concern in the United States health care industry. The…

  9. Personal health record systems and their security protection.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Win, Khin Than; Susilo, Willy; Mu, Yi

    2006-08-01

    The objective of this study is to analyze the security protection of personal health record systems. To achieve this we have investigated different personal health record systems, their security functions, and security issues. We have noted that current security mechanisms are not adequate and we have proposed some security mechanisms to tackle these problems.

  10. Electronic Health Records Place 1st at Indy 500

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Navigation Bar Home Current Issue Past Issues EHR Electronic Health Records Place 1st at Indy 500 Past ... last May's Indy 500 had thousands of personal Electronic Health Records on hand for those attending—and ...

  11. Statistical methods to enhance reporting of Aboriginal Australians in routine hospital records using data linkage affect estimates of health disparities.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Randall, Deborah A; Lujic, Sanja; Leyland, Alastair H; Jorm, Louisa R

    2013-10-01

    To investigate under-recording of Aboriginal people in hospital data from New South Wales (NSW), Australia, define algorithms for enhanced reporting, and examine the impact of these algorithms on estimated disparities in cardiovascular and injury outcomes. NSW Admitted Patient Data were linked with NSW mortality data (2001-2007). Associations with recording of Aboriginal status were investigated using multilevel logistic regression. The number of admissions reported as Aboriginal according to six algorithms was compared with the original (unenhanced) Aboriginal status variable. Age-standardised admission, and 30- and 365-day mortality ratios were estimated for cardiovascular disease and injury. Sixty per cent of the variation in recording of Aboriginal status was due to the hospital of admission, with poorer recording in private and major city hospitals. All enhancement algorithms increased the number of admissions reported as Aboriginal, from between 4.1% and 37.8%. Admission and mortality ratios varied markedly between algorithms, with less strict algorithms resulting in higher admission rate ratios, but generally lower mortality rate ratios, particularly for cardiovascular disease. The choice of enhancement algorithm has an impact on the number of people reported as Aboriginal and on estimated outcome ratios. The influence of the hospital on recording of Aboriginal status highlights the importance of continued efforts to improve data collection. Estimates of Aboriginal health disparity can change depending on how Aboriginal status is reported. Sensitivity analyses using a number of algorithms are recommended. © 2013 The Authors. ANZJPH © 2013 Public Health Association of Australia.

  12. Transfer of information from personal health records: a survey of veterans using My HealtheVet.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Turvey, Carolyn L; Zulman, Donna M; Nazi, Kim M; Wakefield, Bonnie J; Woods, Susan S; Hogan, Timothy P; Weaver, Frances M; McInnes, Keith

    2012-03-01

    Personal health records provide patients with ownership of their health information and allow them to share information with multiple healthcare providers. However, the usefulness of these records relies on patients understanding and using their records appropriately. My HealtheVet is a Web-based patient portal containing a personal health record administered by the Veterans Health Administration. The goal of this study was to explore veterans' interest and use of My HealtheVet to transfer and share information as well as to identify opportunities to increase veteran use of the My HealtheVet functions. Two waves of data were collected in 2010 through an American Customer Satisfaction Index Web-based survey. A random sample of veterans using My HealtheVet was invited to participate in the survey conducted on the My HealtheVet portal through a Web-based pop-up browser window. Wave One results (n=25,898) found that 41% of veterans reported printing information, 21% reported saving information electronically, and only 4% ever sent information from My HealtheVet to another person. In Wave Two (n=18,471), 30% reported self-entering medication information, with 18% sharing this information with their Veterans Affairs (VA) provider and 9.6% sharing with their non-VA provider. Although veterans are transferring important medical information from their personal health records, increased education and awareness are needed to increase use. Personal health records have the potential to improve continuity of care. However, more research is needed on both the barriers to adoption as well as the actual impact on patient health outcomes and well-being.

  13. Dental Electronic Health Record Evaluation

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Chleborád, K.; Zvára Jr., Karel; Dostálová, T.; Zvára, Karel; Ivančáková, R.; Zvárová, Jana; Smidl, L.; Trmal, J.; Psutka, J.

    2013-01-01

    Roč. 1, č. 1 (2013), s. 50-50 ISSN 1805-8698. [EFMI 2013 Special Topic Conference. 17.04.2013-19.04.2013, Prague] Institutional support: RVO:67985807 Keywords : dentistry * medical documentation * electronic health record Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science

  14. Utilizing Dental Electronic Health Records Data to Predict Risk for Periodontal Disease.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thyvalikakath, Thankam P; Padman, Rema; Vyawahare, Karnali; Darade, Pratiksha; Paranjape, Rhucha

    2015-01-01

    Periodontal disease is a major cause for tooth loss and adversely affects individuals' oral health and quality of life. Research shows its potential association with systemic diseases like diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and social habits such as smoking. This study explores mining potential risk factors from dental electronic health records to predict and display patients' contextualized risk for periodontal disease. We retrieved relevant risk factors from structured and unstructured data on 2,370 patients who underwent comprehensive oral examinations at the Indiana University School of Dentistry, Indianapolis, IN, USA. Predicting overall risk and displaying relationships between risk factors and their influence on the patient's oral and general health can be a powerful educational and disease management tool for patients and clinicians at the point of care.

  15. Electronic Personal Health Record Use Among Nurses in the Nursing Informatics Community.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gartrell, Kyungsook; Trinkoff, Alison M; Storr, Carla L; Wilson, Marisa L

    2015-07-01

    An electronic personal health record is a patient-centric tool that enables patients to securely access, manage, and share their health information with healthcare providers. It is presumed the nursing informatics community would be early adopters of electronic personal health record, yet no studies have been identified that examine the personal adoption of electronic personal health record's for their own healthcare. For this study, we sampled nurse members of the American Medical Informatics Association and the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society with 183 responding. Multiple logistic regression analysis was used to identify those factors associated with electronic personal health record use. Overall, 72% were electronic personal health record users. Users tended to be older (aged >50 years), be more highly educated (72% master's or doctoral degrees), and hold positions as clinical informatics specialists or chief nursing informatics officers. Those whose healthcare providers used electronic health records were significantly more likely to use electronic personal health records (odds ratio, 5.99; 95% confidence interval, 1.40-25.61). Electronic personal health record users were significantly less concerned about privacy of health information online than nonusers (odds ratio, 0.32; 95% confidence interval, 0.14-0.70) adjusted for ethnicity, race, and practice region. Informatics nurses, with their patient-centered view of technology, are in prime position to influence development of electronic personal health records. Our findings can inform policy efforts to encourage informatics and other professional nursing groups to become leaders and users of electronic personal health record; such use could help them endorse and engage patients to use electronic personal health records. Having champions with expertise in and enthusiasm for the new technology can promote the adoptionof electronic personal health records among healthcare providers as well as

  16. OmniPHR: A distributed architecture model to integrate personal health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Roehrs, Alex; da Costa, Cristiano André; da Rosa Righi, Rodrigo

    2017-07-01

    The advances in the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) brought many benefits to the healthcare area, specially to digital storage of patients' health records. However, it is still a challenge to have a unified viewpoint of patients' health history, because typically health data is scattered among different health organizations. Furthermore, there are several standards for these records, some of them open and others proprietary. Usually health records are stored in databases within health organizations and rarely have external access. This situation applies mainly to cases where patients' data are maintained by healthcare providers, known as EHRs (Electronic Health Records). In case of PHRs (Personal Health Records), in which patients by definition can manage their health records, they usually have no control over their data stored in healthcare providers' databases. Thereby, we envision two main challenges regarding PHR context: first, how patients could have a unified view of their scattered health records, and second, how healthcare providers can access up-to-date data regarding their patients, even though changes occurred elsewhere. For addressing these issues, this work proposes a model named OmniPHR, a distributed model to integrate PHRs, for patients and healthcare providers use. The scientific contribution is to propose an architecture model to support a distributed PHR, where patients can maintain their health history in an unified viewpoint, from any device anywhere. Likewise, for healthcare providers, the possibility of having their patients data interconnected among health organizations. The evaluation demonstrates the feasibility of the model in maintaining health records distributed in an architecture model that promotes a unified view of PHR with elasticity and scalability of the solution. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  17. Factors affecting physicians’ use of a dedicated overview interface in an electronic health record

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Jensen, Lotte Groth; Bossen, Claus

    2016-01-01

    Background : It remains a continual challenge to present information in user interfaces in large IT systems to support overview in the best possible way. We here examine how an Electronic Health Record (EHR) supports the creation of overview among hospital physicians with a particular focus...... the reasons for its use and non-use Method: We conducted exploratory ethnographic fieldwork among physicians in two hospitals and gathered statistical data on their use of the overview interface. From the quantitative data, we identified where the interface was used most and conducted 18 semi-structured, open-ended...... on the use of an interface designed to provide clinicians with a patient information overview. The overview interface integrates information flexibly from diverse places in the EHR and presents this information in one screen display. Our study revealed widespread non-use of the overview interface. We explore...

  18. Nurses' Perceptions of the Electronic Health Record

    Science.gov (United States)

    Crawley, Rocquel Devonne

    2013-01-01

    The implementation of electronic health records (EHR) by health care organizations has been limited. Despite the broad consensus on the potential benefits of EHRs, health care organizations have been slow to adopt the technology. The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to explore licensed practical and registered nurses'…

  19. Nurses' Experiences of an Initial and Reimplemented Electronic Health Record Use.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chang, Chi-Ping; Lee, Ting-Ting; Liu, Chia-Hui; Mills, Mary Etta

    2016-04-01

    The electronic health record is a key component of healthcare information systems. Currently, numerous hospitals have adopted electronic health records to replace paper-based records to document care processes and improve care quality. Integrating healthcare information system into traditional nursing daily operations requires time and effort for nurses to become familiarized with this new technology. In the stages of electronic health record implementation, smooth adoption can streamline clinical nursing activities. In order to explore the adoption process, a descriptive qualitative study design and focus group interviews were conducted 3 months after and 2 years after electronic health record system implementation (system aborted 1 year in between) in one hospital located in southern Taiwan. Content analysis was performed to analyze the interview data, and six main themes were derived, in the first stage: (1) liability, work stress, and anticipation for electronic health record; (2) slow network speed, user-unfriendly design for learning process; (3) insufficient information technology/organization support; on the second stage: (4) getting used to electronic health record and further system requirements, (5) benefits of electronic health record in time saving and documentation, (6) unrealistic information technology competence expectation and future use. It concluded that user-friendly design and support by informatics technology and manpower backup would facilitate this adoption process as well.

  20. Disassociation for electronic health record privacy.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Loukides, Grigorios; Liagouris, John; Gkoulalas-Divanis, Aris; Terrovitis, Manolis

    2014-08-01

    The dissemination of Electronic Health Record (EHR) data, beyond the originating healthcare institutions, can enable large-scale, low-cost medical studies that have the potential to improve public health. Thus, funding bodies, such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the U.S., encourage or require the dissemination of EHR data, and a growing number of innovative medical investigations are being performed using such data. However, simply disseminating EHR data, after removing identifying information, may risk privacy, as patients can still be linked with their record, based on diagnosis codes. This paper proposes the first approach that prevents this type of data linkage using disassociation, an operation that transforms records by splitting them into carefully selected subsets. Our approach preserves privacy with significantly lower data utility loss than existing methods and does not require data owners to specify diagnosis codes that may lead to identity disclosure, as these methods do. Consequently, it can be employed when data need to be shared broadly and be used in studies, beyond the intended ones. Through extensive experiments using EHR data, we demonstrate that our method can construct data that are highly useful for supporting various types of clinical case count studies and general medical analysis tasks. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  1. Meeting the health information needs of prostate cancer patients using personal health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pai, H H; Lau, F; Barnett, J; Jones, S

    2013-12-01

    There is interest in the use of health information technology in the form of personal health record (phr) systems to support patient needs for health information, care, and decision-making, particularly for patients with distressing, chronic diseases such as prostate cancer (pca). We sought feedback from pca patients who used a phr. For 6 months, 22 pca patients in various phases of care at the BC Cancer Agency (bcca) were given access to a secure Web-based phr called provider, which they could use to view their medical records and use a set of support tools. Feedback was obtained using an end-of-study survey on usability, satisfaction, and concerns with provider. Site activity was recorded to assess usage patterns. Of the 17 patients who completed the study, 29% encountered some minor difficulties using provider. No security breaches were known to have occurred. The two most commonly accessed medical records were laboratory test results and transcribed doctor's notes. Of survey respondents, 94% were satisfied with the access to their medical records, 65% said that provider helped to answer their questions, 77% felt that their privacy and confidentiality were preserved, 65% felt that using provider helped them to communicate better with their physicians, 83% found new and useful information that they would not have received by talking to their health care providers, and 88% said that they would continue to use provider. Our results support the notion that phrs can provide cancer patients with timely access to their medical records and health information, and can assist in communication with health care providers, in knowledge generation, and in patient empowerment.

  2. Occupational Health Record-keeping System (OHRS)

    Data.gov (United States)

    Department of Veterans Affairs — Occupational Health Record-keeping System (OHRS) is part of the Clinical Information Support System (CISS) portal framework and the initial CISS partner system. OHRS...

  3. Electronic health records: what are the most important barriers?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ayatollahi, Haleh; Mirani, Nader; Haghani, Hamid

    2014-01-01

    The process of design and adoption of electronic health records may face a number of barriers. This study aimed to compare the importance of the main barriers from the experts' point of views in Iran. This survey study was completed in 2011. The potential participants (62 experts) included faculty members who worked in departments of health information technology and individuals who worked in the Ministry of Health in Iran and were in charge of the development and adoption of electronic health records. No sampling method was used in this study. Data were collected using a Likert-scale questionnaire ranging from 1 to 5. The validity of the questionnaire was established using content and face validity methods, and the reliability was calculated using Cronbach's alpha coefficient. The response rate was 51.6 percent. The participants' perspectives showed that the most important barriers in the process of design and adoption of electronic health records were technical barriers (mean = 3.84). Financial and ethical-legal barriers, with the mean value of 3.80 were other important barriers, and individual and organizational barriers, with the mean values of 3.59 and 3.50 were found to be less important than other barriers from the experts' perspectives. Strategic planning for the creation and adoption of electronic health records in the country, creating a team of experts to assess the potential barriers and develop strategies to eliminate them, and allocating financial resources can help to overcome most important barriers to the adoption of electronic health records.

  4. The need for academic electronic health record systems in nurse education.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chung, Joohyun; Cho, Insook

    2017-07-01

    The nursing profession has been slow to incorporate information technology into formal nurse education and practice. The aim of this study was to identify the use of academic electronic health record systems in nurse education and to determine student and faculty perceptions of academic electronic health record systems in nurse education. A quantitative research design with supportive qualitative research was used to gather information on nursing students' perceptions and nursing faculty's perceptions of academic electronic health record systems in nurse education. Eighty-three participants (21 nursing faculty and 62 students), from 5 nursing schools, participated in the study. A purposive sample of 9 nursing faculty was recruited from one university in the Midwestern United States to provide qualitative data for the study. The researcher-designed surveys (completed by faculty and students) were used for quantitative data collection. Qualitative data was taken from interviews, which were transcribed verbatim for analysis. Students and faculty agreed that academic electronic health record systems could be useful for teaching students to think critically about nursing documentation. Quantitative and qualitative findings revealed that academic electronic health record systems regarding nursing documentation could help prepare students for the future of health information technology. Meaningful adoption of academic electronic health record systems will help in building the undergraduate nursing students' competence in nursing documentation with electronic health record systems. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

  5. Moving electronic medical records upstream: incorporating social determinants of health.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gottlieb, Laura M; Tirozzi, Karen J; Manchanda, Rishi; Burns, Abby R; Sandel, Megan T

    2015-02-01

    Knowledge of the biological pathways and mechanisms connecting social factors with health has increased exponentially over the past 25 years, yet in most clinical settings, screening and intervention around social determinants of health are not part of standard clinical care. Electronic medical records provide new opportunities for assessing and managing social needs in clinical settings, particularly those serving vulnerable populations. To illustrate the feasibility of capturing information and promoting interventions related to social determinants of health in electronic medical records. Three case studies were examined in which electronic medical records have been used to collect data and address social determinants of health in clinical settings. From these case studies, we identified multiple functions that electronic medical records can perform to facilitate the integration of social determinants of health into clinical systems, including screening, triaging, referring, tracking, and data sharing. If barriers related to incentives, training, and privacy can be overcome, electronic medical record systems can improve the integration of social determinants of health into healthcare delivery systems. More evidence is needed to evaluate the impact of such integration on health care outcomes before widespread adoption can be recommended. Copyright © 2015 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  6. Integrating an Academic Electronic Health Record: Challenges and Success Strategies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Herbert, Valerie M; Connors, Helen

    2016-08-01

    Technology is increasing the complexity in the role of today's nurse. Healthcare organizations are integrating more health information technologies and relying on the electronic health record for data collection, communication, and decision making. Nursing faculty need to prepare graduates for this environment and incorporate an academic electronic health record into a nursing curriculum to meet student-program outcomes. Although the need exists for student preparation, some nursing programs are struggling with implementation, whereas others have been successful. To better understand these complexities, this project was intended to identify current challenges and success strategies of effective academic electronic health record integration into nursing curricula. Using Rogers' 1962 Diffusion of Innovation theory as a framework for technology adoption, a descriptive survey design was used to gain insights from deans and program directors of nursing schools involved with the national Health Informatics & Technology Scholars faculty development program or Cerner's Academic Education Solution Consortium, working to integrate an academic electronic health record in their respective nursing schools. The participants' experiences highlighted approaches used by these schools to integrate these technologies. Data from this project provide nursing education with effective strategies and potential challenges that should be addressed for successful academic electronic health record integration.

  7. Electronic health record use, intensity of hospital care, and patient outcomes.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Blecker, Saul; Goldfeld, Keith; Park, Naeun; Shine, Daniel; Austrian, Jonathan S; Braithwaite, R Scott; Radford, Martha J; Gourevitch, Marc N

    2014-03-01

    Previous studies have suggested that weekend hospital care is inferior to weekday care and that this difference may be related to diminished care intensity. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a metric for measuring intensity of hospital care based on use of the electronic health record was associated with patient-level outcomes. We performed a cohort study of hospitalizations at an academic medical center. Intensity of care was defined as the hourly number of provider accessions of the electronic health record, termed "electronic health record interactions." Hospitalizations were categorized on the basis of the mean difference in electronic health record interactions between the first Friday and the first Saturday of hospitalization. We used regression models to determine the association of these categories with patient outcomes after adjusting for covariates. Electronic health record interactions decreased from Friday to Saturday in 77% of the 9051 hospitalizations included in the study. Compared with hospitalizations with no change in Friday to Saturday electronic health record interactions, the relative lengths of stay for hospitalizations with a small, moderate, and large decrease in electronic health record interactions were 1.05 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.00-1.10), 1.11 (95% CI, 1.05-1.17), and 1.25 (95% CI, 1.15-1.35), respectively. Although a large decrease in electronic health record interactions was associated with in-hospital mortality, these findings were not significant after risk adjustment (odds ratio 1.74, 95% CI, 0.93-3.25). Intensity of inpatient care, measured by electronic health record interactions, significantly diminished from Friday to Saturday, and this decrease was associated with length of stay. Hospitals should consider monitoring and correcting temporal fluctuations in care intensity. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  8. Electronic health records access during a disaster.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Morchel, Herman; Raheem, Murad; Stevens, Lee

    2014-01-01

    As has been demonstrated previously, medical care providers that employ an electronic health records (EHR) system provide more appropriate, cost effective care. Those providers are also better positioned than those who rely on paper records to recover if their facility is damaged as a result of severe storms, fires, or other events. The events surrounding Superstorm Sandy in 2012 made it apparent that, with relatively little additional effort and investment, health care providers with EHR systems may be able to use those systems for patient care purposes even during disasters that result in damage to buildings and facilities, widespread power outages, or both.

  9. Preserving medical correctness, readability and consistency in de-identified health records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Pantazos, Kostas; Lauesen, Søren; Lippert, Søren

    2016-01-01

    A health record database contains structured data fields that identify the patient, such as patient ID, patient name, e-mail and phone number. These data are fairly easy to de-identify, that is, replace with other identifiers. However, these data also occur in fields with doctors’ free-text notes...... database, ending up with 323,122 patient health records. We had to invent many methods for de-identifying potential identifiers in the free-text notes. The de-identified health records should be used with caution for statistical purposes because we removed health records that were so special...

  10. Aspects of privacy for electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Haas, Sebastian; Wohlgemuth, Sven; Echizen, Isao; Sonehara, Noboru; Müller, Günter

    2011-02-01

    Patients' medical data have been originally generated and maintained by health professionals in several independent electronic health records (EHRs). Centralized electronic health records accumulate medical data of patients to improve their availability and completeness; EHRs are not tied to a single medical institution anymore. Nowadays enterprises with the capacity and knowledge to maintain this kind of databases offer the services of maintaining EHRs and adding personal health data by the patients. These enterprises get access on the patients' medical data and act as a main point for collecting and disclosing personal data to third parties, e.g. among others doctors, healthcare service providers and drug stores. Existing systems like Microsoft HealthVault and Google Health comply with data protection acts by letting the patients decide on the usage and disclosure of their data. But they fail in satisfying essential requirements to privacy. We propose a privacy-protecting information system for controlled disclosure of personal data to third parties. Firstly, patients should be able to express and enforce obligations regarding a disclosure of health data to third parties. Secondly, an organization providing EHRs should neither be able to gain access to these health data nor establish a profile about patients. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  11. Safeguarding Confidentiality in Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shenoy, Akhil; Appel, Jacob M

    2017-04-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) offer significant advantages over paper charts, such as ease of portability, facilitated communication, and a decreased risk of medical errors; however, important ethical concerns related to patient confidentiality remain. Although legal protections have been implemented, in practice, EHRs may be still prone to breaches that threaten patient privacy. Potential safeguards are essential, and have been implemented especially in sensitive areas such as mental illness, substance abuse, and sexual health. Features of one institutional model are described that may illustrate the efforts to both ensure adequate transparency and ensure patient confidentiality. Trust and the therapeutic alliance are critical to the provider-patient relationship and quality healthcare services. All of the benefits of an EHR are only possible if patients retain confidence in the security and accuracy of their medical records.

  12. A PRIVACY MANAGEMENT ARCHITECTURE FOR PATIENT-CONTROLLED PERSONAL HEALTH RECORD SYSTEM

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    MD. NURUL HUDA

    2009-06-01

    Full Text Available Patient-controlled personal health record systems can help make health care safer, cheaper, and more convenient by facilitating patients to 1 grant any care provider access to their complete personal health records anytime from anywhere, 2 avoid repeated tests and 3 control their privacy transparently. In this paper, we present the architecture of our Privacy-aware Patient-controlled Personal Health Record (P3HR system through which a patient can view her integrated health history, and share her health information transparently with others (e.g., healthcare providers. Access to the health information of a particular patient is completely controlled by that patient. We also carry out intuitive security and privacy analysis of the P3HR system architecture considering different types of security attacks. Finally, we describe a prototype implementation of the P3HR system that we developed reflecting the special view of Japanese society. The most important advantage of P3HR system over other existing systems is that most likely P3HR system provides complete privacy protection without losing data accuracy. Unlike traditional partially anonymous health records (e.g., using k-anonymity or l-diversity, the health records in P3HR are closer to complete anonymity, and yet preserve data accuracy. Our approach makes it very unlikely that patients could be identified by an attacker from their anonymous health records in the P3HR system.

  13. Ethical questions must be considered for electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Spriggs, Merle; Arnold, Michael V; Pearce, Christopher M; Fry, Craig

    2012-09-01

    National electronic health record initiatives are in progress in many countries around the world but the debate about the ethical issues and how they are to be addressed remains overshadowed by other issues. The discourse to which all others are answerable is a technical discourse, even where matters of privacy and consent are concerned. Yet a focus on technical issues and a failure to think about ethics are cited as factors in the failure of the UK health record system. In this paper, while the prime concern is the Australian Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR), the discussion is relevant to and informed by the international context. The authors draw attention to ethical and conceptual issues that have implications for the success or failure of electronic health records systems. Important ethical issues to consider as Australia moves towards a PCEHR system include: issues of equity that arise in the context of personal control, who benefits and who should pay, what are the legitimate uses of PCEHRs, and how we should implement privacy. The authors identify specific questions that need addressing.

  14. Electronic health records and online medical records: an asset or a liability under current conditions?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Allen-Graham, Judith; Mitchell, Lauren; Heriot, Natalie; Armani, Roksana; Langton, David; Levinson, Michele; Young, Alan; Smith, Julian A; Kotsimbos, Tom; Wilson, John W

    2018-02-01

    Objective The aim of the present study was to audit the current use of medical records to determine completeness and concordance with other sources of medical information. Methods Medical records for 40 patients from each of five Melbourne major metropolitan hospitals were randomly selected (n=200). A quantitative audit was performed for detailed patient information and medical record keeping, as well as data collection, storage and utilisation. Using each hospital's current online clinical database, scanned files and paperwork available for each patient audited, the reviewers sourced as much relevant information as possible within a 30-min time allocation from both the record and the discharge summary. Results Of all medical records audited, 82% contained medical and surgical history, allergy information and patient demographics. All audited discharge summaries lacked at least one of the following: demographics, medication allergies, medical and surgical history, medications and adverse drug event information. Only 49% of records audited showed evidence the discharge summary was sent outside the institution. Conclusions The quality of medical data captured and information management is variable across hospitals. It is recommended that medical history documentation guidelines and standardised discharge summaries be implemented in Australian healthcare services. What is known about this topic? Australia has a complex health system, the government has approved funding to develop a universal online electronic medical record system and is currently trialling this in an opt-out style in the Napean Blue Mountains (NSW) and in Northern Queensland. The system was originally named the personally controlled electronic health record but has since been changed to MyHealth Record (2016). In Victoria, there exists a wide range of electronic health records used to varying degrees, with some hospitals still relying on paper-based records and many using scanned medical records

  15. Underserved Pregnant and Postpartum Women's Access and Use of Their Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Guo, Yuqing; Hildebrand, Janet; Rousseau, Julie; Brown, Brandon; Pimentel, Pamela; Olshansky, Ellen

    The purpose of this study was to examine knowledge of and experiences with use of their electronic health record (EHR) among mostly Hispanic women during pregnancy and postpartum. Women who were in the MOMS Orange County prenatal or postpartum home visitation program completed surveys and participated in focus groups. Descriptive and content analyses were used. Twenty-six women participated. Nearly all women (24, 92.3%) knew what health records were and most (80.8%) felt that keeping their records would increase or greatly increase their confidence in caring for themselves and their families. Approximately one third reported already keeping a copy of their health records. Common barriers to accessing and understanding health records included healthcare providers' noncompliance with the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, limited EHR adoption, unfriendly patient portals, complicated medical terminology, rushed appointments with healthcare providers, lack of Spanish interpreters, and lack of Spanish-speaking healthcare providers. Programs are needed to educate and support women and providers in using health records to promote health literacy, pregnancy management, and patient-provider relationships in underserved populations.

  16. On-the-job training of health professionals for electronic health record and electronic medical record use: A scoping review

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Valentina L. Younge

    2015-09-01

    Full Text Available The implementation of electronic health records (EHRs or electronic medical records (EMRs is well documented in health informatics literature yet, very few studies focus primarily on how health professionals in direct clinical care are trained for EHR or EMR use. Purpose: To investigate how health professionals in direct clinical care are trained to prepare them for EHR or EMR use. Methods: Systematic searches were conducted in CINAHL, EMBASE, Ovid MEDLINE, PsycINFO, PubMed and ISI WoS and, the Arksey and O’Malley scoping methodological framework was used to collect the data and analyze the results. Results: Training was done at implementation, orientation and post-implementation. Implementation and orientation training had a broader scope while post-implementation training focused on proficiency, efficiency and improvement. The multiplicity of training methods, types and levels of training identified appear to suggest that training is more effective when a combination of training methods are used.

  17. Fine-Grained Access Control for Electronic Health Record Systems

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hue, Pham Thi Bach; Wohlgemuth, Sven; Echizen, Isao; Thuy, Dong Thi Bich; Thuc, Nguyen Dinh

    There needs to be a strategy for securing the privacy of patients when exchanging health records between various entities over the Internet. Despite the fact that health care providers such as Google Health and Microsoft Corp.'s Health Vault comply with the U.S Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the privacy of patients is still at risk. Several encryption schemes and access control mechanisms have been suggested to protect the disclosure of a patient's health record especially from unauthorized entities. However, by implementing these approaches, data owners are not capable of controlling and protecting the disclosure of the individual sensitive attributes of their health records. This raises the need to adopt a secure mechanism to protect personal information against unauthorized disclosure. Therefore, we propose a new Fine-grained Access Control (FGAC) mechanism that is based on subkeys, which would allow a data owner to further control the access to his data at the column-level. We also propose a new mechanism to efficiently reduce the number of keys maintained by a data owner in cases when the users have different access privileges to different columns of the data being shared.

  18. The use of electronic health records in Spanish hospitals.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marca, Guillem; Perez, Angel; Blanco-Garcia, Martin German; Miravalles, Elena; Soley, Pere; Ortiga, Berta

    The aims of this study were to describe the level of adoption of electronic health records in Spanish hospitals and to identify potential barriers and facilitators to this process. We used an observational cross-sectional design. The survey was conducted between September and December 2011, using an electronic questionnaire distributed through email. We obtained a 30% response rate from the 214 hospitals contacted, all belonging to the Spanish National Health Service. The level of adoption of electronic health records in Spanish hospitals was found to be high: 39.1% of hospitals surveyed had a comprehensive EHR system while a basic system was functioning in 32.8% of the cases. However, in 2011 one third of the hospitals did not have a basic electronic health record system, although some have since implemented electronic functionalities, particularly those related to clinical documentation and patient administration. Respondents cited the acquisition and implementation costs as the main barriers to implementation. Facilitators for EHR implementation were: the possibility to hire technical support, both during and post implementation; security certification warranty; and objective third-party evaluations of EHR products. In conclusion, the number of hospitals that have electronic health records is in general high, being relatively higher in medium-sized hospitals.

  19. Future of electronic health records: implications for decision support.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rothman, Brian; Leonard, Joan C; Vigoda, Michael M

    2012-01-01

    The potential benefits of the electronic health record over traditional paper are many, including cost containment, reductions in errors, and improved compliance by utilizing real-time data. The highest functional level of the electronic health record (EHR) is clinical decision support (CDS) and process automation, which are expected to enhance patient health and healthcare. The authors provide an overview of the progress in using patient data more efficiently and effectively through clinical decision support to improve health care delivery, how decision support impacts anesthesia practice, and how some are leading the way using these systems to solve need-specific issues. Clinical decision support uses passive or active decision support to modify clinician behavior through recommendations of specific actions. Recommendations may reduce medication errors, which would result in considerable savings by avoiding adverse drug events. In selected studies, clinical decision support has been shown to decrease the time to follow-up actions, and prediction has proved useful in forecasting patient outcomes, avoiding costs, and correctly prompting treatment plan modifications by clinicians before engaging in decision-making. Clinical documentation accuracy and completeness is improved by an electronic health record and greater relevance of care data is delivered. Clinical decision support may increase clinician adherence to clinical guidelines, but educational workshops may be equally effective. Unintentional consequences of clinical decision support, such as alert desensitization, can decrease the effectiveness of a system. Current anesthesia clinical decision support use includes antibiotic administration timing, improved documentation, more timely billing, and postoperative nausea and vomiting prophylaxis. Electronic health record implementation offers data-mining opportunities to improve operational, financial, and clinical processes. Using electronic health record data

  20. Accessing Your Health Information: How can I access my health information and medical records?

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... from the doctor’s office. Visit the Guide to Getting & Using Your Health Records for practical tips to help you access, review, and make the most of your health records. Open Survey Content last reviewed on April 4, 2018 Was this page helpful? Yes No Form Approved OMB# 0990-0379 Exp. Date ...

  1. Management of laboratory data and information exchange in the electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wilkerson, Myra L; Henricks, Walter H; Castellani, William J; Whitsitt, Mark S; Sinard, John H

    2015-03-01

    In the era of the electronic health record, the success of laboratories and pathologists will depend on effective presentation and management of laboratory information, including test orders and results, and effective exchange of data between the laboratory information system and the electronic health record. In this third paper of a series that explores empowerment of pathology in the era of the electronic health record, we review key elements of managing laboratory information within the electronic health record and examine functional issues pertinent to pathologists and laboratories in the exchange of laboratory information between electronic health records and both anatomic and clinical pathology laboratory information systems. Issues with electronic order-entry and results-reporting interfaces are described, and considerations for setting up these interfaces are detailed in tables. The role of the laboratory medical director as mandated by the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments of 1988 and the impacts of discordance between laboratory results and their display in the electronic health record are also discussed.

  2. Evaluating the data completeness in the Electronic Health Record after the Implementation of an Outpatient Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Soto, Mauricio; Capurro, Daniel; Catalán, Silvia

    2015-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) present an opportunity for quality improvement in health organitations, particularly at the primary health level. However, EHR implementation impacts clinical workflows, and physicians frequently prefer to document in a non-structured way, which ultimately hinders the ability to measure quality indicators. We present an assessment of data completeness-a key data quality indicator-during the first 12 months after the implementation of an EHR at a teaching outpatient center in Santiago, Chile.

  3. Use of electronic health records and administrative data for public health surveillance of eye health and vision-related conditions in the United States.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elliott, Amanda F; Davidson, Arthur; Lum, Flora; Chiang, Michael F; Saaddine, Jinan B; Zhang, Xinzhi; Crews, John E; Chou, Chiu-Fang

    2012-12-01

    To discuss the current trend toward greater use of electronic health records and how these records could enhance public health surveillance of eye health and vision-related conditions. Perspective, comparing systems. We describe 3 currently available sources of electronic health data (Kaiser Permanente, the Veterans Health Administration, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) and how these sources can contribute to a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system. Each of the 3 sources of electronic health data can contribute meaningfully to a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system, but none currently provide all the information required. The use of electronic health records for vision and eye health surveillance has both advantages and disadvantages. Electronic health records may provide additional information needed to create a comprehensive vision and eye health surveillance system. Recommendations for incorporating electronic health records into such a system are presented. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  4. Text mining electronic health records to identify hospital adverse events

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerdes, Lars Ulrik; Hardahl, Christian

    2013-01-01

    Manual reviews of health records to identify possible adverse events are time consuming. We are developing a method based on natural language processing to quickly search electronic health records for common triggers and adverse events. Our results agree fairly well with those obtained using manu...

  5. Validation of asthma recording in electronic health records: protocol for a systematic review.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nissen, Francis; Quint, Jennifer K; Wilkinson, Samantha; Mullerova, Hana; Smeeth, Liam; Douglas, Ian J

    2017-05-29

    Asthma is a common, heterogeneous disease with significant morbidity and mortality worldwide. It can be difficult to define in epidemiological studies using electronic health records as the diagnosis is based on non-specific respiratory symptoms and spirometry, neither of which are routinely registered. Electronic health records can nonetheless be valuable to study the epidemiology, management, healthcare use and control of asthma. For health databases to be useful sources of information, asthma diagnoses should ideally be validated. The primary objectives are to provide an overview of the methods used to validate asthma diagnoses in electronic health records and summarise the results of the validation studies. EMBASE and MEDLINE will be systematically searched for appropriate search terms. The searches will cover all studies in these databases up to October 2016 with no start date and will yield studies that have validated algorithms or codes for the diagnosis of asthma in electronic health records. At least one test validation measure (sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value or other) is necessary for inclusion. In addition, we require the validated algorithms to be compared with an external golden standard, such as a manual review, a questionnaire or an independent second database. We will summarise key data including author, year of publication, country, time period, date, data source, population, case characteristics, clinical events, algorithms, gold standard and validation statistics in a uniform table. This study is a synthesis of previously published studies and, therefore, no ethical approval is required. The results will be submitted to a peer-reviewed journal for publication. Results from this systematic review can be used to study outcome research on asthma and can be used to identify case definitions for asthma. CRD42016041798. © Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the

  6. Does the Perception that Stress Affects Health Matter? The Association with Health and Mortality

    Science.gov (United States)

    Keller, Abiola; Litzelman, Kristin; Wisk, Lauren E.; Maddox, Torsheika; Cheng, Erika Rose; Creswell, Paul D.; Witt, Whitney P.

    2012-01-01

    Objective This study sought to examine the relationship among the amount of stress, the perception that stress affects health, and health and mortality outcomes in a nationally-representative sample of U.S. adults. Methods Data from the 1998 National Health Interview Survey were linked to prospective National Death Index mortality data through 2006. Separate logistic regression models were used to examine the factors associated with current health status and psychological distress. Cox proportional hazard models were used to determine the impact of perceiving that stress affects health on all-cause mortality. Each model specifically examined the interaction between the amount of stress and the perception that stress affects health, controlling for sociodemographic, health behavior, and access to healthcare factors. Results 33.7% of nearly 186 million (n=28,753) U.S. adults perceived that stress affected their health a lot or to some extent. Both higher levels of reported stress and the perception that stress affects health were independently associated with an increased likelihood of worse health and mental health outcomes. The amount of stress and the perception that stress affects health interacted such that those who reported a lot of stress and that stress impacted their health a lot had a 43% increased risk of premature death (HR = 1.43, 95% CI [1.20, 1.71]). Conclusions High amounts of stress and the perception that stress impacts health are each associated with poor health and mental health. Individuals who perceived that stress affects their health and reported a large amount of stress had an increased risk of premature death. PMID:22201278

  7. The Relationship Between Magnet Designation, Electronic Health Record Adoption, and Medicare Meaningful Use Payments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lippincott, Christine; Foronda, Cynthia; Zdanowicz, Martin; McCabe, Brian E; Ambrosia, Todd

    2017-08-01

    The objective of this study was to examine the relationship between nursing excellence and electronic health record adoption. Of 6582 US hospitals, 4939 were eligible for the Medicare Electronic Health Record Incentive Program, and 6419 were eligible for evaluation on the HIMSS Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model. Of 399 Magnet hospitals, 330 were eligible for the Medicare Electronic Health Record Incentive Program, and 393 were eligible for evaluation in the HIMSS Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model. Meaningful use attestation was defined as receipt of a Medicare Electronic Health Record Incentive Program payment. The adoption electronic health record was defined as Level 6 and/or 7 on the HIMSS Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model. Logistic regression showed that Magnet-designated hospitals were more likely attest to Meaningful Use than non-Magnet hospitals (odds ratio = 3.58, P electronic health records than non-Magnet hospitals (Level 6 only: odds ratio = 3.68, P electronic health record use, which involves earning financial incentives for successful adoption. Continued investigation is needed to examine the relationships between the quality of nursing care, electronic health record usage, financial implications, and patient outcomes.

  8. Health and safety record of the nuclear industry

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Carter, M.W.; Carruthers, E.; Button, J.C.E.

    1975-09-01

    This paper examines the claim of the nuclear industry to have an excellent safety record, in terms of health and accident records of workers in the industry. It does not consider accidents which have not resulted in harm to the workers' health. The nuclear industry is considered to include all work with ionising radiations and radioactive materials, in education, research, medicine and industry. Since 'safety' is not an absolute concept, comparisons are made with the published records of other industries, and a study is made of the performance of the nuclear industry in relation to its own safety criteria. Data are presented on the radiation exposure of nuclear workers in Europe, America, India and Australia, in relation to the internationally recommended limits, and there is some discussion of the risks involved in these limits. The death rate in parts of the nuclear industry in America, the United Kingdom, and Australia is presented and compared with the death rate for other industries in those countries, and a listing is made of deaths caused by radiation in the period 1945 to 1968. Injury rates for the US and Australian nuclear industries are also compared with the injury rates for other industries in these countries. Consideration is given to the safety record of individual components of the nuclear industry (using the wide definition of this industry given above), special attention being given to health records of uranium miners, plutonium workers and radiologists. Although there are difficulties in obtaining sufficiently detailed information of this kind it is considered that the data presented, relative to any reasonable standard, demonstrate that the nuclear industry has a safety record to be proud of. (author)

  9. Modelling and implementing electronic health records in Denmark

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bernstein, Knut; Rasmussen, Morten Bruun; Vingtoft, Søren

    2003-01-01

    The Danish Health IT strategy points out that integration between electronic health records (EHR) systems has a high priority. This paper reporst reports new tendencies in modelling and integration platforms globally and how this is reflected in the natinal development....

  10. Implementing an Open Source Electronic Health Record System in Kenyan Health Care Facilities: Case Study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Muinga, Naomi; Magare, Steve; Monda, Jonathan; Kamau, Onesmus; Houston, Stuart; Fraser, Hamish; Powell, John; English, Mike; Paton, Chris

    2018-04-18

    The Kenyan government, working with international partners and local organizations, has developed an eHealth strategy, specified standards, and guidelines for electronic health record adoption in public hospitals and implemented two major health information technology projects: District Health Information Software Version 2, for collating national health care indicators and a rollout of the KenyaEMR and International Quality Care Health Management Information Systems, for managing 600 HIV clinics across the country. Following these projects, a modified version of the Open Medical Record System electronic health record was specified and developed to fulfill the clinical and administrative requirements of health care facilities operated by devolved counties in Kenya and to automate the process of collating health care indicators and entering them into the District Health Information Software Version 2 system. We aimed to present a descriptive case study of the implementation of an open source electronic health record system in public health care facilities in Kenya. We conducted a landscape review of existing literature concerning eHealth policies and electronic health record development in Kenya. Following initial discussions with the Ministry of Health, the World Health Organization, and implementing partners, we conducted a series of visits to implementing sites to conduct semistructured individual interviews and group discussions with stakeholders to produce a historical case study of the implementation. This case study describes how consultants based in Kenya, working with developers in India and project stakeholders, implemented the new system into several public hospitals in a county in rural Kenya. The implementation process included upgrading the hospital information technology infrastructure, training users, and attempting to garner administrative and clinical buy-in for adoption of the system. The initial deployment was ultimately scaled back due to a

  11. Personal, Electronic, Secure National Library of Medicine Hosts Health Records Conference

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Bar Home Current Issue Past Issues EHR Personal, Electronic, Secure: National Library of Medicine Hosts Health Records ... One suggestion for saving money is to implement electronic personal health records. With this in mind, the ...

  12. Impact of an Electronic Health Record-Integrated Personal Health Record on Patient Participation in Health Care: Development and Randomized Controlled Trial of MyHealthKeeper.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ryu, Borim; Kim, Nari; Heo, Eunyoung; Yoo, Sooyoung; Lee, Keehyuck; Hwang, Hee; Kim, Jeong-Whun; Kim, Yoojung; Lee, Joongseek; Jung, Se Young

    2017-12-07

    Personal health record (PHR)-based health care management systems can improve patient engagement and data-driven medical diagnosis in a clinical setting. The purpose of this study was (1) to demonstrate the development of an electronic health record (EHR)-tethered PHR app named MyHealthKeeper, which can retrieve data from a wearable device and deliver these data to a hospital EHR system, and (2) to study the effectiveness of a PHR data-driven clinical intervention with clinical trial results. To improve the conventional EHR-tethered PHR, we ascertained clinicians' unmet needs regarding PHR functionality and the data frequently used in the field through a cocreation workshop. We incorporated the requirements into the system design and architecture of the MyHealthKeeper PHR module. We constructed the app and validated the effectiveness of the PHR module by conducting a 4-week clinical trial. We used a commercially available activity tracker (Misfit) to collect individual physical activity data, and developed the MyHealthKeeper mobile phone app to record participants' patterns of daily food intake and activity logs. We randomly assigned 80 participants to either the PHR-based intervention group (n=51) or the control group (n=29). All of the study participants completed a paper-based survey, a laboratory test, a physical examination, and an opinion interview. During the 4-week study period, we collected health-related mobile data, and study participants visited the outpatient clinic twice and received PHR-based clinical diagnosis and recommendations. A total of 68 participants (44 in the intervention group and 24 in the control group) completed the study. The PHR intervention group showed significantly higher weight loss than the control group (mean 1.4 kg, 95% CI 0.9-1.9; Phealth tracker system and its potential to improve patient clinical profiles. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03200119; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03200119 (Archived by WebCite at http

  13. Patient Perceptions of Electronic Health Records

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lulejian, Armine

    2011-01-01

    Research objective. Electronic Health Records (EHR) are expected to transform the way medicine is delivered with patients/consumers being the intended beneficiaries. However, little is known regarding patient knowledge and attitudes about EHRs. This study examined patient perceptions about EHR. Study design. Surveys were administered following…

  14. Do Electronic Health Records Help or Hinder Medical Education?

    OpenAIRE

    Peled, Jonathan U.; Sagher, Oren; Morrow, Jay B.; Dobbie, Alison E.

    2009-01-01

    Background to the Debate Background to the debate: Many countries worldwide are digitizing patients' medical records. In the United States, the recent economic stimulus package (?the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009?), signed into law by President Obama, includes $US17 billion in incentives for health providers to switch to electronic health records (EHRs). The package also includes $US2 billion for the development of EHR standards and best-practice guidelines. What impact will ...

  15. Identifying Barriers in the Use of Electronic Health Records in Hawai‘i

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hamamura, Faith D; Hughes, Kira

    2017-01-01

    Hawai‘i faces unique challenges to Electronic Health Record (EHR) adoption due to physician shortages, a widespread distribution of Medically Underserved Areas and Populations (MUA/P), and a higher percentage of small independent practices. However, research on EHR adoption in Hawai‘i is limited. To address this gap, this article examines the current state of EHR in Hawai‘i, the barriers to adoption, and the future of Health Information Technology (HIT) initiatives to improve the health of Hawai‘i's people. Eight focus groups were conducted on Lana‘i, Maui, Hawai‘i Island, Kaua‘i, Moloka‘i, and O‘ahu. In these groups, a total of 51 diverse health professionals were asked about the functionality of EHR systems, barriers to use, facilitators of use, and what EHRs would look like in a perfect world. Responses were summarized and analyzed based on constant comparative analysis techniques. Responses were then clustered into thirteen themes: system compatibility, loss of productivity, poor interface, IT support, hardware/software, patient factors, education/training, noise in the system, safety, data quality concerns, quality metrics, workflow, and malpractice concerns. Results show that every group mentioned system compatibility. In response to these findings, the Health eNet Community Health Record initiative — which allows providers web-based access to patient health information from the patient's provider network— was developed as a step toward alleviating some of the barriers to sharing information between different EHRs. The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) legislation will introduce a new payment model in 2017 that is partially based on EHR utilization. Therefore, more research should be done to understand EHR adoption and how this ruling will affect providers in Hawai‘i. PMID:28435756

  16. Geometric data perturbation-based personal health record transactions in cloud computing.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Balasubramaniam, S; Kavitha, V

    2015-01-01

    Cloud computing is a new delivery model for information technology services and it typically involves the provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources over the Internet. However, cloud computing raises concerns on how cloud service providers, user organizations, and governments should handle such information and interactions. Personal health records represent an emerging patient-centric model for health information exchange, and they are outsourced for storage by third parties, such as cloud providers. With these records, it is necessary for each patient to encrypt their own personal health data before uploading them to cloud servers. Current techniques for encryption primarily rely on conventional cryptographic approaches. However, key management issues remain largely unsolved with these cryptographic-based encryption techniques. We propose that personal health record transactions be managed using geometric data perturbation in cloud computing. In our proposed scheme, the personal health record database is perturbed using geometric data perturbation and outsourced to the Amazon EC2 cloud.

  17. Geometric Data Perturbation-Based Personal Health Record Transactions in Cloud Computing

    Science.gov (United States)

    Balasubramaniam, S.; Kavitha, V.

    2015-01-01

    Cloud computing is a new delivery model for information technology services and it typically involves the provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources over the Internet. However, cloud computing raises concerns on how cloud service providers, user organizations, and governments should handle such information and interactions. Personal health records represent an emerging patient-centric model for health information exchange, and they are outsourced for storage by third parties, such as cloud providers. With these records, it is necessary for each patient to encrypt their own personal health data before uploading them to cloud servers. Current techniques for encryption primarily rely on conventional cryptographic approaches. However, key management issues remain largely unsolved with these cryptographic-based encryption techniques. We propose that personal health record transactions be managed using geometric data perturbation in cloud computing. In our proposed scheme, the personal health record database is perturbed using geometric data perturbation and outsourced to the Amazon EC2 cloud. PMID:25767826

  18. Geometric Data Perturbation-Based Personal Health Record Transactions in Cloud Computing

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    S. Balasubramaniam

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Cloud computing is a new delivery model for information technology services and it typically involves the provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources over the Internet. However, cloud computing raises concerns on how cloud service providers, user organizations, and governments should handle such information and interactions. Personal health records represent an emerging patient-centric model for health information exchange, and they are outsourced for storage by third parties, such as cloud providers. With these records, it is necessary for each patient to encrypt their own personal health data before uploading them to cloud servers. Current techniques for encryption primarily rely on conventional cryptographic approaches. However, key management issues remain largely unsolved with these cryptographic-based encryption techniques. We propose that personal health record transactions be managed using geometric data perturbation in cloud computing. In our proposed scheme, the personal health record database is perturbed using geometric data perturbation and outsourced to the Amazon EC2 cloud.

  19. Patient health record on a smart card.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Naszlady, A; Naszlady, J

    1998-02-01

    A validated health questionnaire has been used for the documentation of a patient's history (826 items) and of the findings from physical examination (591 items) in our clinical ward for 25 years. This computerized patient record has been completed in EUCLIDES code (CEN TC/251) for laboratory tests and an ATC and EAN code listing for the names of the drugs permanently required by the patient. In addition, emergency data were also included on an EEPROM chipcard with a 24 kb capacity. The program is written in FOX-PRO language. A group of 5000 chronically ill in-patients received these cards which contain their health data. For security reasons the contents of the smart card is only accessible by a doctor's PIN coded key card. The personalization of each card was carried out in our health center and the depersonalized alphanumeric data were collected for further statistical evaluation. This information served as a basis for a real need assessment of health care and for the calculation of its cost. Code-combined with an optical card, a completely paperless electronic patient record system has been developed containing all three information carriers in medicine: Texts, Curves and Pictures.

  20. Positive affect, negative affect, stress, and social support as mediators of the forgiveness-health relationship.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Green, Michelle; Decourville, Nancy; Sadava, Stanley

    2012-01-01

    Structural equation modeling was used to test a model in which positive affect, negative affect, perceived stress, and social support were hypothesized to mediate the relationship between forgiveness and mental and physical health. Six hundred and twenty-three undergraduates completed a battery of self-report measures. Results of the analyses indicated that the forgiveness-health relation was mediated by positive affect, negative affect, stress, and the interrelationship between negative affect and stress. There was limited support for social support and the interrelationship between positive affect and social support as mediators. The results suggested that the relationship between forgiveness and health is mediated rather than direct. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

  1. DETAILED CLINICAL MODELS AND THEIR RELATION WITH ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS.

    OpenAIRE

    Boscá Tomás, Diego

    2016-01-01

    [EN] Healthcare domain produces and consumes big quantities of people's health data. Although data exchange is the norm rather than the exception, being able to access to all patient data is still far from achieved. Current developments such as personal health records will introduce even more data and complexity to the Electronic Health Records (EHR). Achieving semantic interoperability is one of the biggest challenges to overcome in order to benefit from all the information contained in the ...

  2. Indivo: a personally controlled health record for health information exchange and communication

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Crawford William CR

    2007-09-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Personally controlled health records (PCHRs, a subset of personal health records (PHRs, enable a patient to assemble, maintain and manage a secure copy of his or her medical data. Indivo (formerly PING is an open source, open standards PCHR with an open application programming interface (API. Results We describe how the PCHR platform can provide standard building blocks for networked PHR applications. Indivo allows the ready integration of diverse sources of medical data under a patient's control through the use of standards-based communication protocols and APIs for connecting PCHRs to existing and future health information systems. Conclusion The strict and transparent personal control model is designed to encourage widespread participation by patients, healthcare providers and institutions, thus creating the ecosystem for development of innovative, consumer-focused healthcare applications.

  3. Integrated Nationwide Electronic Health Records system: Semi-distributed architecture approach.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fragidis, Leonidas L; Chatzoglou, Prodromos D; Aggelidis, Vassilios P

    2016-11-14

    The integration of heterogeneous electronic health records systems by building an interoperable nationwide electronic health record system provides undisputable benefits in health care, like superior health information quality, medical errors prevention and cost saving. This paper proposes a semi-distributed system architecture approach for an integrated national electronic health record system incorporating the advantages of the two dominant approaches, the centralized architecture and the distributed architecture. The high level design of the main elements for the proposed architecture is provided along with diagrams of execution and operation and data synchronization architecture for the proposed solution. The proposed approach effectively handles issues related to redundancy, consistency, security, privacy, availability, load balancing, maintainability, complexity and interoperability of citizen's health data. The proposed semi-distributed architecture offers a robust interoperability framework without healthcare providers to change their local EHR systems. It is a pragmatic approach taking into account the characteristics of the Greek national healthcare system along with the national public administration data communication network infrastructure, for achieving EHR integration with acceptable implementation cost.

  4. Importance of health physics records in litigation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Forbes, J.L.

    1982-01-01

    The nuclear insurance pools, through American Nuclear Insurers (ANI) and the Mutual Atomic Energy Liability Underwriters (MAELU), have been providing the third-party liability insurance required of the nuclear industry by the Price-Anderson Act since 1957. Records of claims of radiation injury have been kept for twenty-five years, and a recent upsurge of the claim rate has been noted. An explanation for this new trend is postulated and some examples are discussed. The use of health physics records as evidence in litigation is described, and specific examples of the types of records required to defend against past and future claims are given

  5. Electronic Health Record for Forensic Dentistry

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Zvárová, Jana; Dostálová, T.; Hanzlíček, Petr; Teuberová, Z.; Nagy, Miroslav; Pieš, Martin; Seydlová, M.; Eliášová, H.; Šimková, H.

    2008-01-01

    Roč. 47, č. 1 (2008), s. 8-13 ISSN 0026-1270 R&D Projects: GA MŠk(CZ) 1M06014 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * structured data entry * forensic dentistry Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science Impact factor: 1.057, year: 2008

  6. Survey of patient and public perceptions of electronic health records for healthcare, policy and research: Study protocol

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Luchenski Serena

    2012-05-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Immediate access to patients’ complete health records via electronic databases could improve healthcare and facilitate health research. However, the possible benefits of a national electronic health records (EHR system must be balanced against public concerns about data security and personal privacy. Successful development of EHR requires better understanding of the views of the public and those most affected by EHR: users of the National Health Service. This study aims to explore the correlation between personal healthcare experience (including number of healthcare contacts and number and type of longer term conditions and views relating to development of EHR for healthcare, health services planning and policy and health research. Methods/design A multi-site cross-sectional self-complete questionnaire designed and piloted for use in waiting rooms was administered to patients from randomly selected outpatients’ clinics at a university teaching hospital (431 beds and general practice surgeries from the four primary care trusts within the catchment area of the hospital. All patients entering the selected outpatients clinics and general practice surgeries were invited to take part in the survey during August-September 2011. Statistical analyses will be conducted using descriptive techniques to present respondents’ overall views about electronic health records and logistic regression to explore associations between these views and participants’ personal circumstances, experiences, sociodemographics and more specific views about electronic health records. Discussion The study design and implementation were successful, resulting in unusually high response rates and overall recruitment (85.5%, 5336 responses. Rates for face-to-face recruitment in previous work are variable, but typically lower (mean 76.7%, SD 20. We discuss details of how we collected the data to provide insight into how we obtained this unusually high

  7. Disease Recording Systems and Herd Health Schemes for Production Diseases

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Østerås O

    2001-03-01

    Full Text Available Disease recording of cattle is compulsory in Sweden and Norway. Sweden and Denmark also have mandatory disease recording for swine, whereas Finland and Norway only have compulsory recording of infectious diseases. Both compulsory and voluntary systems are databased, the first ones developed in the 1970's. Disease recording at pig slaughtering is somewhat older. The veterinary practitioner, and often also the farmer, can report treated cases as well as fertility disturbances to the systems. Disease recording at slaughter is carried out by veterinarians and inspection officers. The databases are handled by the veterinary authorities or the agricultural organisations in each country. Costs are defrayed by the authorities and/or the agricultural industry. The farmers receive periodic reports. Data are stored for three to ten years, often longer. Affiliation to animal health schemes for cattle or swine is voluntary. In Sweden and Denmark (cattle they are run within the scope of government regulations. Affiliation to animal health programmes may also be demanded by organisations within the agricultural industry. These organisations are also responsible for the administration of the programmes. Costs to take part in herd health schemes are covered by the farmers themselves. In certain cases, grants are received from agricultural organisations, authorities, or the European Union. Recording of diseases and the format of animal health schemes in the Nordic countries are described here in order to illustrate the possibilities to compare data between countries.

  8. The home-based maternal record: a tool for family involvement in health care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shah, P M; Shah, K P; Belsey, M A

    1988-04-01

    The home-based maternal record offers an opportunity for family involvement in health care. Home-based records of maternal health have been used in several developing countries, and have led to increased detection and monitoring of women at high risk for complications during pregnancy. Home-based cards that include menstrual information remind health workers to educate and motivate women for family planning, and serve as a source of health statistics. Records that use pictures and symbols have been used by illiterate traditional birth attendants, and had an accurate completion rate of over 90%. The WHO has prepared a prototype record and guidelines for local adaptation. The objectives were to provide continuity of care throughout pregnancy, ensure recognition of at-risk women, encourage family participation in health care, an provide data on maternal health, breastfeeding, and family planning. The guidelines have been evaluated and results show that the records have improved the coverage, acceptability, and quality of MCH/FP care. The records have also led to an increase in diagnosis and referral of at-risk women and newborns, and the use of family planning and tetanus toxoid immunization has increased in the 13 centers where the reports are being used. Focus group discussions have shown that mothers, community members, primary health workers, and doctors and nurses liked the records. It is important to adapt criteria for high-risk conditions to the local areas where the records will be used to ensure the relevance of risk diagnosis. The evidence shows that home-based maternal and child records can be an important tool in the promotion of self-reliance and family participation in health care. In addition, home-based records can be used for the implementation of primary health care at the local level, and serve as a resource for data collection.

  9. Mental health in war-affected populations

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Scholte, W.F.

    2013-01-01

    This book addresses mental health problems in populations in nonwestern war-affected regions, and methods to mitigate these problems through interventions focusing on social reintegration. It describes a number of studies among war-affected populations in widely different areas: refugees from the

  10. Ethical, legal, and social implications of incorporating genomic information into electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hazin, Ribhi; Brothers, Kyle B; Malin, Bradley A; Koenig, Barbara A; Sanderson, Saskia C; Rothstein, Mark A; Williams, Marc S; Clayton, Ellen W; Kullo, Iftikhar J

    2013-10-01

    The inclusion of genomic data in the electronic health record raises important ethical, legal, and social issues. In this article, we highlight these challenges and discuss potential solutions. We provide a brief background on the current state of electronic health records in the context of genomic medicine, discuss the importance of equitable access to genome-enabled electronic health records, and consider the potential use of electronic health records for improving genomic literacy in patients and providers. We highlight the importance of privacy, access, and security, and of determining which genomic information is included in the electronic health record. Finally, we discuss the challenges of reporting incidental findings, storing and reinterpreting genomic data, and nondocumentation and duty to warn family members at potential genetic risk.

  11. Exploring faculty perceptions towards electronic health records for nursing education.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kowitlawakul, Y; Chan, S W C; Wang, L; Wang, W

    2014-12-01

    The use of electronic health records in nursing education is rapidly increasing worldwide. The successful implementation of electronic health records for nursing education software program relies on students as well as nursing faculty members. This study aimed to explore the experiences and perceptions of nursing faculty members using electronic health records for nursing education software program, and to identify the influential factors for successful implementation of this technology. This exploratory qualitative study was conducted using in-depth individual interviews at a university in Singapore. Seven faculty members participated in the study. The data were gathered and analysed at the end of the semester in the 2012/2013 academic year. The participants' perceptions of the software program were organized into three main categories: innovation, transition and integration. The participants perceived this technology as innovative, with both values and challenges for the users. In addition, using the new software program was perceived as transitional process. The integration of this technology required time from faculty members and students, as well as support from administrators. The software program had only been implemented for 2-3 months at the time of the interviews. Consequently, the participants might have lacked the necessary skill and competence and confidence to implement it successfully. In addition, the unequal exposure to the software program might have had an impact on participants' perceptions. The findings show that the integration of electronic health records into nursing education curricula is dependent on the faculty members' experiences with the new technology, as well as their perceptions of it. Hence, cultivating a positive attitude towards the use of new technologies is important. Electronic health records are significant applications of health information technology. Health informatics competency should be included as a required competency

  12. Nurse's use of power to standardise nursing terminology in electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ali, Samira; Sieloff, Christina L

    2017-07-01

    To describe nurses' use of power to influence the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. Little is known about nurses' potential use of power to influence the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. The theory of group power within organisations informed the design of the descriptive, cross-sectional study used a survey method to assess nurses' use of power to influence the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. The Sieloff-King Assessment of Group Power within Organizations © and Nursing Power Scale was used. A total of 232 nurses responded to the survey. The mean power capability score was moderately high at 134.22 (SD 18.49), suggesting that nurses could use power to achieve the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. The nurses' power capacity was significantly correlated with their power capability (r = 0.96, P power to achieve their goals, such as the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. Nurse administrators may use their power to influence the incorporation of standardised nursing terminology within electronic health records. If nurses lack power, this could decrease nurses' ability to achieve their goals and contribute to the achievement of effective patient outcomes. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  13. Exploiting Multimodal Biometrics in E-Privacy Scheme for Electronic Health Records

    OpenAIRE

    Omotosho, Adebayo; Adegbola, Omotanwa; Adelakin, Barakat; Adelakun, Adeyemi; Emuoyibofarhe, Justice

    2015-01-01

    Existing approaches to protect the privacy of Electronic Health Records are either insufficient for existing medical laws or they are too restrictive in their usage. For example, smart card-based encryption systems require the patient to be always present to authorize access to medical records. Questionnaires were administered by 50 medical practitioners to identify and categorize different Electronic Health Records attributes. The system was implemented using multi biometrics of patients to ...

  14. The Electronic Health Record Objective Structured Clinical Examination: Assessing Student Competency in Patient Interactions While Using the Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Biagioli, Frances E; Elliot, Diane L; Palmer, Ryan T; Graichen, Carla C; Rdesinski, Rebecca E; Ashok Kumar, Kaparaboyna; Galper, Ari B; Tysinger, James W

    2017-01-01

    Because many medical students do not have access to electronic health records (EHRs) in the clinical environment, simulated EHR training is necessary. Explicitly training medical students to use EHRs appropriately during patient encounters equips them to engage patients while also attending to the accuracy of the record and contributing to a culture of information safety. Faculty developed and successfully implemented an EHR objective structured clinical examination (EHR-OSCE) for clerkship students at two institutions. The EHR-OSCE objectives include assessing EHR-related communication and data management skills. The authors collected performance data for students (n = 71) at the first institution during academic years 2011-2013 and for students (n = 211) at the second institution during academic year 2013-2014. EHR-OSCE assessment checklist scores showed that students performed well in EHR-related communication tasks, such as maintaining eye contact and stopping all computer work when the patient expresses worry. Findings indicated student EHR skill deficiencies in the areas of EHR data management including medical history review, medication reconciliation, and allergy reconciliation. Most students' EHR skills failed to improve as the year progressed, suggesting that they did not gain the EHR training and experience they need in clinics and hospitals. Cross-institutional data comparisons will help determine whether differences in curricula affect students' EHR skills. National and institutional policies and faculty development are needed to ensure that students receive adequate EHR education, including hands-on experience in the clinic as well as simulated EHR practice.

  15. Why sub-Saharan Africa lags in electronic health record adoption and possible strategies to increase its adoption in this region

    OpenAIRE

    Odekunle, Florence Femi; Odekunle, Raphael Oluseun; Shankar, Srinivasan

    2017-01-01

    Poor health information system has been identified as a major challenge in the health-care system in many developing countries including sub-Saharan African countries. Electronic health record (EHR) has been shown as an important tool to improve access to patient information with attendance improved quality of care. However, EHR has not been widely implemented/adopted in sub-Saharan Africa. This study sought to identify factors that affect the adoption of an EHR in sub-Saharan Africa and stra...

  16. Forecasting the Use of Electronic Health Records, An Exp...

    Data.gov (United States)

    U.S. Department of Health & Human Services — The authors of Forecasting the Use of Electronic Health Records, An Expert Opinion Approach, published in Volume 3, Issue 2 of the Medicare and Medicaid Research...

  17. Shared Electronic Health Record Systems: Key Legal and Security Challenges.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Christiansen, Ellen K; Skipenes, Eva; Hausken, Marie F; Skeie, Svein; Østbye, Truls; Iversen, Marjolein M

    2017-11-01

    Use of shared electronic health records opens a whole range of new possibilities for flexible and fruitful cooperation among health personnel in different health institutions, to the benefit of the patients. There are, however, unsolved legal and security challenges. The overall aim of this article is to highlight legal and security challenges that should be considered before using shared electronic cooperation platforms and health record systems to avoid legal and security "surprises" subsequent to the implementation. Practical lessons learned from the use of a web-based ulcer record system involving patients, community nurses, GPs, and hospital nurses and doctors in specialist health care are used to illustrate challenges we faced. Discussion of possible legal and security challenges is critical for successful implementation of shared electronic collaboration systems. Key challenges include (1) allocation of responsibility, (2) documentation routines, (3) and integrated or federated access control. We discuss and suggest how challenges of legal and security aspects can be handled. This discussion may be useful for both current and future users, as well as policy makers.

  18. Neonatal Nurses Experience Unintended Consequences and Risks to Patient Safety With Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dudding, Katherine M; Gephart, Sheila M; Carrington, Jane M

    2018-04-01

    In this article, we examine the unintended consequences of nurses' use of electronic health records. We define these as unforeseen events, change in workflow, or an unanticipated result of implementation and use of electronic health records. Unintended consequences experienced by nurses while using electronic health records have been well researched. However, few studies have focused on neonatal nurses, and it is unclear to what extent unintended consequences threaten patient safety. A new instrument called the Carrington-Gephart Unintended Consequences of Electronic Health Record Questionnaire has been validated, and secondary analysis using the tool explored the phenomena among neonatal nurses (N = 40). The purposes of this study were to describe unintended consequences of use of electronic health records for neonatal nurses and to explore relationships between the phenomena and characteristics of the nurse and the electronic health record. The most frequent unintended consequences of electronic health record use were due to interruptions, followed by a heavier workload due to the electronic health record, changes to the workflow, and altered communication patterns. Neonatal nurses used workarounds most often with motivation to better assist patients. Teamwork was moderately related to higher unintended consequences including patient safety risks (r = 0.427, P = .007), system design (r = 0.419, P = .009), and technology barriers (r = 0.431, P = .007). Communication about patients was reduced when patient safety risks were high (r = -0.437, P = .003). By determining the frequency with which neonatal nurses experience unintended consequences of electronic health record use, future research can be targeted to improve electronic health record design through customization, integration, and refinement to support patient safety and better outcomes.

  19. The role of records management professionals in the national health ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The introduction of information communication technologies (ICTs) in the health sector has brought about electronic health (eHealth) which uses computing, networking and communications technologies to improve health delivery. However, the inclusion of records management and archival concerns during system design ...

  20. How physician electronic health record screen sharing affects patient and doctor non-verbal communication in primary care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Asan, Onur; Young, Henry N; Chewning, Betty; Montague, Enid

    2015-03-01

    Use of electronic health records (EHRs) in primary-care exam rooms changes the dynamics of patient-physician interaction. This study examines and compares doctor-patient non-verbal communication (eye-gaze patterns) during primary care encounters for three different screen/information sharing groups: (1) active information sharing, (2) passive information sharing, and (3) technology withdrawal. Researchers video recorded 100 primary-care visits and coded the direction and duration of doctor and patient gaze. Descriptive statistics compared the length of gaze patterns as a percentage of visit length. Lag sequential analysis determined whether physician eye-gaze influenced patient eye gaze, and vice versa, and examined variations across groups. Significant differences were found in duration of gaze across groups. Lag sequential analysis found significant associations between several gaze patterns. Some, such as DGP-PGD ("doctor gaze patient" followed by "patient gaze doctor") were significant for all groups. Others, such DGT-PGU ("doctor gaze technology" followed by "patient gaze unknown") were unique to one group. Some technology use styles (active information sharing) seem to create more patient engagement, while others (passive information sharing) lead to patient disengagement. Doctors can engage patients in communication by using EHRs in the visits. EHR training and design should facilitate this. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  1. Attitude Towards Health Information Privacy and Electronic Health Records Among Urban Sri Lankan Adults.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tissera, Shaluni R; Silva, S N

    2016-01-01

    Sri Lanka is planning to move towards an Electronic Health Record (EHR) system. This research argues that the public preparedness should be considered in order to implement a functioning and an effective EHR system in a country. When asked about how concerned the participants were about the security of their health records, 40.5% stated they were concerned and 38.8% were very concerned. They were asked to rate the 'level of trust' they have on health institutes in Sri Lanka on a scale from 1 to 10 (1 lowest level of trust and 10 highest), 66.1% rated at level 5 or less.

  2. Problems with the electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Ruiter, Hans-Peter; Liaschenko, Joan; Angus, Jan

    2016-01-01

    One of the most significant changes in modern healthcare delivery has been the evolution of the paper record to the electronic health record (EHR). In this paper we argue that the primary change has been a shift in the focus of documentation from monitoring individual patient progress to recording data pertinent to Institutional Priorities (IPs). The specific IPs to which we refer include: finance/reimbursement; risk management/legal considerations; quality improvement/safety initiatives; meeting regulatory and accreditation standards; and patient care delivery/evidence based practice. Following a brief history of the transition from the paper record to the EHR, the authors discuss unintended or contested consequences resulting from this change. These changes primarily reflect changes in the organization and amount of clinician work and clinician-patient relationships. The paper is not a research report but was informed by an institutional ethnography the aim of which was to understand how the EHR impacted clinicians and administrators in a large, urban hospital in the United States. The paper was also informed by other sources, including the philosophies of Jacques Ellul, Don Idhe, and Langdon Winner. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  3. The Internet in Connecting Electronics Health Record Mobile Clients

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hanzlíček, Petr; Špidlen, Josef; Zvárová, Jana

    2002-01-01

    Roč. 10, č. 6 (2002), s. 502-503 ISSN 0928-7329. [Mednet 2002. Qualit-e-Health. World Conference on the Internet in Medicine /7./. 04.12.2002-07.12.2002, Amsterdam] Institutional research plan: AV0Z1030915 Keywords : distributed electronic health record * mobile health data access Subject RIV: BD - Theory of Information

  4. A literature review of record linkage procedures focusing on infant health outcomes

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Carla Jorge Machado

    Full Text Available Record linkage is a powerful tool in assembling information from different data sources and has been used by a number of public health researchers. In this review, we provide an overview of the record linkage methodologies, focusing particularly on probabilistic record linkage. We then stress the purposes and research applications of linking records by focusing on studies of infant health outcomes based on large data sets, and provide a critical review of the studies in Brazil.

  5. MyPHRMachines : lifelong personal health records in the cloud

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Van Gorp, P.M.E.; Comuzzi, M.; Soda, P.; Tortorella, F.

    2012-01-01

    Personal Health Records (PHRs) should remain the lifelong property of patients and should be showable conveniently and securely to selected caregivers. Regarding interoperability, current solutions for PHRs focus on standard data exchange formats and transformations to move data across health

  6. [Views of health system administrators, professionals, and users concerning the electronic health record and facilitators and obstacles to its implementation].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Costa, Jose Felipe Riani; Portela, Margareth Crisóstomo

    2018-02-05

    The design and deployment of complex technologies like the electronic health record (EHR) involve technical, personal, social, and organizational issues. The Brazilian public and private scenario includes different local and regional initiatives for implementation of the electronic health record. The Brazilian Ministry of Health also has a proposal to develop a national EHR. The current study aimed to provide a comprehensive view of perceptions by health system administrators, professionals, and users concerning their experiences with the electronic health record and their opinions of the possibility of developing a national EHR. This qualitative study involved 28 semi-structured interviews. The results revealed both the diversity of factors that can influence the implementation of an electronic health record and the existence of convergences and aspects that tend to be valued differently according to the different points of view. Key aspects include discussions on the electronic health record's attributes and it impact on healthcare, especially in the case of local electronic health records, concerns over costs and confidentiality and privacy pertaining to electronic health records in general, and the possible implications of centralized versus decentralized data storage in the case of a national EHR. The interviews clearly showed the need to establish more effective communication among the various stakeholders, and that the different perspectives should be considered when drafting and deploying an EHR at the local, regional, and national levels.

  7. An analysis of electronic health record-related patient safety incidents.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Palojoki, Sari; Mäkelä, Matti; Lehtonen, Lasse; Saranto, Kaija

    2017-06-01

    The aim of this study was to analyse electronic health record-related patient safety incidents in the patient safety incident reporting database in fully digital hospitals in Finland. We compare Finnish data to similar international data and discuss their content with regard to the literature. We analysed the types of electronic health record-related patient safety incidents that occurred at 23 hospitals during a 2-year period. A procedure of taxonomy mapping served to allow comparisons. This study represents a rare examination of patient safety risks in a fully digital environment. The proportion of electronic health record-related incidents was markedly higher in our study than in previous studies with similar data. Human-computer interaction problems were the most frequently reported. The results show the possibility of error arising from the complex interaction between clinicians and computers.

  8. Patients want granular privacy control over health information in electronic medical records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Caine, Kelly; Hanania, Rima

    2013-01-01

    To assess patients' desire for granular level privacy control over which personal health information should be shared, with whom, and for what purpose; and whether these preferences vary based on sensitivity of health information. A card task for matching health information with providers, questionnaire, and interview with 30 patients whose health information is stored in an electronic medical record system. Most patients' records contained sensitive health information. No patients reported that they would prefer to share all information stored in an electronic medical record (EMR) with all potential recipients. Sharing preferences varied by type of information (EMR data element) and recipient (eg, primary care provider), and overall sharing preferences varied by participant. Patients with and without sensitive records preferred less sharing of sensitive versus less-sensitive information. Patients expressed sharing preferences consistent with a desire for granular privacy control over which health information should be shared with whom and expressed differences in sharing preferences for sensitive versus less-sensitive EMR data. The pattern of results may be used by designers to generate privacy-preserving EMR systems including interfaces for patients to express privacy and sharing preferences. To maintain the level of privacy afforded by medical records and to achieve alignment with patients' preferences, patients should have granular privacy control over information contained in their EMR.

  9. Semantic Interoperability in the Structured Electronic Health Record

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hanzlíček, Petr; Přečková, Petra; Zvárová, Jana

    -, č. 69 (2007), s. 52-53 ISSN 0926-4981 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * terminology * classification Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science

  10. Soil Resources Area Affects Herbivore Health

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Chad M. Dacus

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available Soil productivity effects nutritive quality of food plants, growth of humans and animals, and reproductive health of domestic animals. Game-range surveys sometimes poorly explained variations in wildlife populations, but classification of survey data by major soil types improved effectiveness. Our study evaluates possible health effects of lower condition and reproductive rates for wild populations of Odocoileus virginianus Zimmerman (white-tailed deer in some physiographic regions of Mississippi. We analyzed condition and reproductive data for 2400 female deer from the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks herd health evaluations from 1991–1998. We evaluated age, body mass (Mass, kidney mass, kidney fat mass, number of corpora lutea (CL and fetuses, as well as fetal ages. Region affected kidney fat index (KFI, which is a body condition index, and numbers of fetuses of adults (P ≤ 0.001. Region affected numbers of CL of adults (P ≤ 0.002. Mass and conception date (CD were affected (P ≤ 0.001 by region which interacted significantly with age for Mass (P ≤ 0.001 and CD (P < 0.04. Soil region appears to be a major factor influencing physical characteristics of female deer.

  11. Is patient confidentiality compromised with the electronic health record?: a position paper.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wallace, Ilse M

    2015-02-01

    In order for electronic health records to fulfill their expected benefits, protection of privacy of patient information is key. Lack of trust in confidentiality can lead to reluctance in disclosing all relevant information, which could have grave consequences. This position paper contemplates whether patient confidentiality is compromised by electronic health records. The position that confidentiality is compromised was supported by the four bioethical principles and argued that despite laws and various safeguards to protect patients' confidentiality, numerous data breaches have occurred. The position that confidentiality is not compromised was supported by virtue ethics and a utilitarian viewpoint and argued that safeguards keep information confidential and the public feels relatively safe with the electronic health record. The article concludes with an ethically superior position that confidentiality is compromised with the electronic health record. Although organizational and governmental ways of enhancing the confidentiality of patient information within the electronic health record facilitate confidentiality, the ultimate responsibility of maintaining confidentiality rests with the individual end-users and their ethical code of conduct. The American Nurses Association Code of Ethics for nurses calls for nurses to be watchful with data security in electronic communications.

  12. Implementation of the Agitated Behavior Scale in the Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wilson, Helen John; Dasgupta, Kritis; Michael, Kathleen

    The purpose of the study was to implement an Agitated Behavior Scale through an electronic health record and to evaluate the usability of the scale in a brain injury unit at a rehabilitation hospital. A quality improvement project was conducted in the brain injury unit at a large rehabilitation hospital with registered nurses as participants using convenience sampling. The project consisted of three phases and included education, implementation of the scale in the electronic health record, and administration of the survey questionnaire, which utilized the system usability scale. The Agitated Behavior Scale was found to be usable, and there was 92.2% compliance with the use of the electronic Electronic Agitated Behavior Scale. The Agitated Behavior Scale was effectively implemented in the electronic health record and was found to be usable in the assessment of agitation. Utilization of the scale through the electronic health record on a daily basis will allow for an early identification of agitation in patients with traumatic brain injury and enable prompt interventions to manage agitation.

  13. Electronic health record case studies to advance environmental public health tracking.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Namulanda, Gonza; Qualters, Judith; Vaidyanathan, Ambarish; Roberts, Eric; Richardson, Max; Fraser, Alicia; McVeigh, Katharine H; Patterson, Scott

    2018-03-01

    Data from traditional public health surveillance systems can have some limitations, e.g., timeliness, geographic level, and amount of data accessible. Electronic health records (EHRs) could present an opportunity to supplement current sources of routinely collected surveillance data. The National Environmental Public Health Tracking Program (Tracking Program) sought to explore the use of EHRs for advancing environmental public health surveillance practices. The Tracking Program funded four state/local health departments to obtain and pilot the use of EHR data to address several issues including the challenges and technical requirements for accessing EHR data, and the core data elements required to integrate EHR data within their departments' Tracking Programs. The results of these pilot projects highlighted the potential of EHR data for public health surveillance of rare diseases that may lack comprehensive registries, and surveillance of prevalent health conditions or risk factors for health outcomes at a finer geographic level. EHRs therefore, may have potential to supplement traditional sources of public health surveillance data. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  14. Public Trust in Health Information Sharing: Implications for Biobanking and Electronic Health Record Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jodyn Platt

    2015-02-01

    Full Text Available Biobanks are made all the more valuable when the biological samples they hold can be linked to health information collected in research, electronic health records, or public health practice. Public trust in such systems that share health information for research and health care practice is understudied. Our research examines characteristics of the general public that predict trust in a health system that includes researchers, health care providers, insurance companies and public health departments. We created a 119-item survey of predictors and attributes of system trust and fielded it using Amazon’s MTurk system (n = 447. We found that seeing one’s primary care provider, having a favorable view of data sharing and believing that data sharing will improve the quality of health care, as well as psychosocial factors (altruism and generalized trust were positively and significantly associated with system trust. As expected, privacy concern, but counterintuitively, knowledge about health information sharing were negatively associated with system trust. We conclude that, in order to assure the public’s trust, policy makers charged with setting best practices for governance of biobanks and access to electronic health records should leverage critical access points to engage a diverse public in joint decision making.

  15. Client perceptions of the mental health engagement network: a qualitative analysis of an electronic personal health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Forchuk, Cheryl; Reiss, Jeffrey P; O'Regan, Tony; Ethridge, Paige; Donelle, Lorie; Rudnick, Abraham

    2015-10-14

    Information technologies such as websites, mobile phone applications, and virtual reality programs have been shown to deliver innovative and effective treatments for mental illness. Much of the research studying electronic mental health interventions focuses on symptom reduction; however, to facilitate the implementation of electronic interventions in usual mental health care, it is also important to investigate the perceptions of clients who will be using the technologies. To this end, a qualitative analysis of focus group discussions regarding the Mental Health Engagement Network, a web-based personal health record and smartphone intervention, is presented here. Individuals living in the community with a mood or psychotic disorder (n = 394) were provided with a smartphone and access to an electronic personal health record, the Lawson SMART Record, for 12 to 18 months to manage their mental health. This study employed a delayed-implementation design and obtained both quantitative and qualitative data through individual interviews and focus group sessions. Participants had the opportunity to participate in voluntary focus group sessions at three points throughout the study to discuss their perceptions of the technologies. Qualitative data from 95 focus group participants were analysed using a thematic analysis. Four overarching themes emerged from focus group discussions: 1) Versatile functionality of the Lawson SMART Record and smartphone facilitated use; 2) Aspects of the technologies as barriers to use; 3) Use of the Mental health Engagement Network technologies resulted in perceived positive outcomes; 4) Future enhancement of the Lawson SMART Record and intervention is recommended. These qualitative data provide a valuable contribution to the understanding of how smarttechnologies can be integrated into usual mental health care. Smartphones are extremely portable andcommonplace in society. Therefore, clients can use these devices to manage and track mental

  16. Biometrics for electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Flores Zuniga, Alejandro Enrique; Win, Khin Than; Susilo, Willy

    2010-10-01

    Securing electronic health records, in scenarios in which the provision of care services is share among multiple actors, could become a complex and costly activity. Correct identification of patients and physician, protection of privacy and confidentiality, assignment of access permissions for healthcare providers and resolutions of conflicts rise as main points of concern in the development of interconnected health information networks. Biometric technologies have been proposed as a possible technological solution for these issues due to its ability to provide a mechanism for unique verification of an individual identity. This paper presents an analysis of the benefit as well as disadvantages offered by biometric technology. A comparison between this technology and more traditional identification methods is used to determine the key benefits and flaws of the use biometric in health information systems. The comparison as been made considering the viability of the technologies for medical environments, global security needs, the contemplation of a share care environment and the costs involved in the implementation and maintenance of such technologies. This paper also discusses alternative uses for biometrics technologies in health care environments. The outcome of this analysis lays in the fact that even when biometric technologies offer several advantages over traditional method of identification, they are still in the early stages of providing a suitable solution for a health care environment.

  17. Behavioral Health Providers and Electronic Health Records: An Exploratory Beliefs Elicitation and Segmentation Study

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shank, Nancy

    2011-01-01

    The widespread adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) is a public policy strategy to improve healthcare quality and reduce accelerating health care costs. Much research has focused on medical providers' perceptions of EHRs, but little is known about those of behavioral health providers. This research was informed by the theory of reasoned…

  18. Electronic Health Records: Overcoming Obstacles to Improve Acceptance and Utilization for Mental Health Clinicians

    Science.gov (United States)

    Odom, Stephen A.

    2017-01-01

    The dynamics and progress of the integration of the electronic health record (EHR) into health-care disciplines have been described and examined using theories related to technology adoption. Previous studies have examined health-care clinician resistance to the EHR in primary care, hospital, and urgent care medical settings, but few studies have…

  19. Leveraging electronic health records for predictive modeling of post-surgical complications.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Weller, Grant B; Lovely, Jenna; Larson, David W; Earnshaw, Berton A; Huebner, Marianne

    2017-01-01

    Hospital-specific electronic health record systems are used to inform clinical practice about best practices and quality improvements. Many surgical centers have developed deterministic clinical decision rules to discover adverse events (e.g. postoperative complications) using electronic health record data. However, these data provide opportunities to use probabilistic methods for early prediction of adverse health events, which may be more informative than deterministic algorithms. Electronic health record data from a set of 9598 colorectal surgery cases from 2010 to 2014 were used to predict the occurrence of selected complications including surgical site infection, ileus, and bleeding. Consistent with previous studies, we find a high rate of missing values for both covariates and complication information (4-90%). Several machine learning classification methods are trained on an 80% random sample of cases and tested on a remaining holdout set. Predictive performance varies by complication, although an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve as high as 0.86 on testing data was achieved for bleeding complications, and accuracy for all complications compares favorably to existing clinical decision rules. Our results confirm that electronic health records provide opportunities for improved risk prediction of surgical complications; however, consideration of data quality and consistency standards is an important step in predictive modeling with such data.

  20. Perioperative nurses' attitudes toward the electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yontz, Laura S; Zinn, Jennifer L; Schumacher, Edward J

    2015-02-01

    The adoption of an electronic health record (EHR) is mandated under current health care legislation reform. The EHR provides data that are patient centered and improves patient safety. There are limited data; however, regarding the attitudes of perioperative nurses toward the use of the EHR. The purpose of this project was to identify perioperative nurses' attitudes toward the use of the EHR. Quantitative descriptive survey was used to determine attitudes toward the electronic health record. Perioperative nurses in a southeastern health system completed an online survey to determine their attitudes toward the EHR in providing patient care. Overall, respondents felt the EHR was beneficial, did not add to the workload, improved documentation, and would not eliminate any nursing jobs. Nursing acceptance and the utilization of the EHR are necessary for the successful integration of an EHR and to support the goal of patient-centered care. Identification of attitudes and potential barriers of perioperative nurses in using the EHR will improve patient safety, communication, reduce costs, and empower those who implement an EHR. Copyright © 2015 American Society of PeriAnesthesia Nurses. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  1. Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Portal Implementation Toolkit for Ambulatory Clinics: A Feasibility Study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nahm, Eun-Shim; Diblasi, Catherine; Gonzales, Eva; Silver, Kristi; Zhu, Shijun; Sagherian, Knar; Kongs, Katherine

    2017-04-01

    Personal health records and patient portals have been shown to be effective in managing chronic illnesses. Despite recent nationwide implementation efforts, the personal health record and patient portal adoption rates among patients are low, and the lack of support for patients using the programs remains a critical gap in most implementation processes. In this study, we implemented the Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit in a large diabetes/endocrinology center and assessed its preliminary impact on personal health record and patient portal knowledge, self-efficacy, patient-provider communication, and adherence to treatment plans. Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit is composed of Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit-General, clinic-level resources for clinicians, staff, and patients, and Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit Plus, an optional 4-week online resource program for patients ("MyHealthPortal"). First, Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit-General was implemented, and all clinicians and staff were educated about the center's personal health record and patient portal. Then general patient education was initiated, while a randomized controlled trial was conducted to test the preliminary effects of "MyHealthPortal" using a small sample (n = 74) with three observations (baseline and 4 and 12 weeks). The intervention group showed significantly greater improvement than the control group in patient-provider communication at 4 weeks (t56 = 3.00, P = .004). For other variables, the intervention group tended to show greater improvement; however, the differences were not significant. In this preliminary study, Patient-Centered Personal Health Record and Patient Portal Implementation Toolkit showed potential for filling the gap in the current

  2. Factors Influencing Acceptance of Electronic Health Records in Hospitals

    OpenAIRE

    Wilkins, Melinda A

    2009-01-01

    The study's aim was to examine factors that may influence health information managers in the adoption of electronic health records. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) served as theoretical foundation for this quantitative study. Hospital health information managers in Arkansas were queried as to the constructs of perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and behavior intention. The study population comprised 94 health information managers with a return rate of 74.5 percent. One manager ...

  3. 76 FR 56503 - Agency Information Collection Activity (VSO Access to VHA Electronic Health Records) Under OMB...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-09-13

    ... (VSO Access to VHA Electronic Health Records) Under OMB Review AGENCY: Veterans Health Administration... Electronic Health Records, VA Form 10- 0400. OMB Control Number: 2900-0710. Type of Review: Extension of a... power of attorney by veterans who have medical information recorded in VHA electronic health records...

  4. Pan-Canadian Respiratory Standards Initiative for Electronic Health Records (PRESTINE: 2011 National Forum Proceedings

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    M Diane Lougheed

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available In a novel knowledge translation initiative, the Government of Ontario’s Asthma Plan of Action funded the development of an Asthma Care Map to enable adherence with the Canadian Asthma Consensus Guidelines developed under the auspices of the Canadian Thoracic Society (CTS. Following its successful evaluation within the Primary Care Asthma Pilot Project, respiratory clinicians from the Asthma Research Unit, Queen’s University (Kingston, Ontario are leading an initiative to incorporate standardized Asthma Care Map data elements into electronic health records in primary care in Ontario. Acknowledging that the issue of data standards affects all respiratory conditions, and all provinces and territories, the Government of Ontario approached the CTS Respiratory Guidelines Committee. At its meeting in September 2010, the CTS Respiratory Guidelines Committee agreed that developing and standardizing respiratory data elements for electronic health records are strategically important. In follow-up to that commitment, representatives from the CTS, the Lung Association, the Government of Ontario, the National Lung Health Framework and Canada Health Infoway came together to form a planning committee. The planning committee proposed a phased approach to inform stakeholders about the issue, and engage them in the development, implementation and evaluation of a standardized dataset. An environmental scan was completed in July 2011, which identified data definitions and standards currently available for clinical variables that are likely to be included in electronic medical records in primary care for diagnosis, management and patient education related to asthma and COPD. The scan, sponsored by the Government of Ontario, includes compliance with clinical nomenclatures such as SNOMED-CT® and LOINC®. To help launch and create momentum for this initiative, a national forum was convened on October 2 and 3, 2011, in Toronto, Ontario. The forum was designed to

  5. Does health affect portfolio choice?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Love, David A; Smith, Paul A

    2010-12-01

    A number of recent studies find that poor health is empirically associated with a safer portfolio allocation. It is difficult to say, however, whether this relationship is truly causal. Both health status and portfolio choice are influenced by unobserved characteristics such as risk attitudes, impatience, information, and motivation, and these unobserved factors, if not adequately controlled for, can induce significant bias in the estimates of asset demand equations. Using the 1992-2006 waves of the Health and Retirement Study, we investigate how much of the connection between health and portfolio choice is causal and how much is due to the effects of unobserved heterogeneity. Accounting for unobserved heterogeneity with fixed effects and correlated random effects models, we find that health does not appear to significantly affect portfolio choice among single households. For married households, we find a small effect (about 2-3 percentage points) from being in the lowest of five self-reported health categories. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  6. How Can Spirituality Affect Your Family's Health?

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Safe Videos for Educators Search English Español How Can Spirituality Affect Your Family's Health? KidsHealth / For Parents / ... found among those who strictly practiced their religion. Can Spiritual Beliefs Enhance Parenting? Attending organized religious services ...

  7. Incorporating Personal Health Records into the Disease Management of Rural Heart Failure Patients

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baron, Karen Parsley

    2012-01-01

    Personal Health Records (PHRs) allow patients to access and in some cases manage their own health records. Their potential benefits include access to health information, enhanced asynchronous communication between patients and clinicians, and convenience of online appointment scheduling and prescription refills. Potential barriers to PHR use…

  8. Arsenic in Drinking Water in Bangladesh: Factors Affecting Child Health

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aziz, Sonia N.; Aziz, Khwaja M. S.; Boyle, Kevin J.

    2014-01-01

    The focus of this paper is to present an empirical model of factors affecting child health by observing actions households take to avoid exposure to arsenic in drinking water. Millions of Bangladeshis face multiple health hazards from high levels of arsenic in drinking water. Safe water sources are either expensive or difficult to access, affecting people’s individuals’ time available for work and ultimately affecting the health of household members. Since children are particularly susceptible and live with parents who are primary decision makers for sustenance, parental actions linking child health outcomes is used in the empirical model. Empirical results suggest that child health is significantly affected by the age and gender of the household water procurer. Adults with a high degree of concern for children’s health risk from arsenic contamination, and who actively mitigate their arsenic contaminated water have a positive effect on child health. PMID:24982854

  9. User Interface of MUDR Electronic Health Record

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hanzlíček, Petr; Špidlen, Josef; Heroutová, Helena; Nagy, Miroslav

    2005-01-01

    Roč. 74, - (2005), s. 221-227 ISSN 1386-5056 R&D Projects: GA MŠk LN00B107 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * user interface * data entry * knowledge base Subject RIV: BB - Applied Statistics, Operational Research Impact factor: 1.374, year: 2005

  10. Electronic Health Records and US Public Health: Current Realities and Future Promise

    Science.gov (United States)

    Parrish, R. Gibson; Ross, David A.

    2013-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) could contribute to improving population health in the United States. Realizing this potential will require understanding what EHRs can realistically offer to efforts to improve population health, the requirements for obtaining useful information from EHRs, and a plan for addressing these requirements. Potential contributions of EHRs to improving population health include better understanding of the level and distribution of disease, function, and well-being within populations. Requirements are improved population coverage of EHRs, standardized EHR content and reporting methods, and adequate legal authority for using EHRs, particularly for population health. A collaborative national effort to address the most pressing prerequisites for and barriers to the use of EHRs for improving population health is needed to realize the EHR’s potential. PMID:23865646

  11. Citizens and personal health records - the case of Nelson Mandela Bay.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pottas, Dalenca; Mostert-Phipps, Nicky

    2013-01-01

    This paper explores citizen attitudes towards personal health records. The study was conducted in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. A cross-sectional design was used and structured questionnaires administered by data collectors. Most respondents (90%) believed it to be important to extremely important for their healthcare provider to have their complete medical records. Less than half of them (42%), however, believed that the healthcare provider did have their complete medical record available to them. Nevertheless, 69% do not keep a medical record as a way to address this concern. Most of them (84%) were not aware of the existence of electronic tools to capture a personal health record prior to participating in the survey. Concerns relating to the use of online PHRs were identified as privacy (58%), lack of time (27%) and a disinterest in computers (22%). It was found that the existence of a medical chronic condition is a strong predictor of keeping a medical record (albeit mostly in paper-based format).

  12. Stakeholder engagement: a key component of integrating genomic information into electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hartzler, Andrea; McCarty, Catherine A; Rasmussen, Luke V; Williams, Marc S; Brilliant, Murray; Bowton, Erica A; Clayton, Ellen Wright; Faucett, William A; Ferryman, Kadija; Field, Julie R; Fullerton, Stephanie M; Horowitz, Carol R; Koenig, Barbara A; McCormick, Jennifer B; Ralston, James D; Sanderson, Saskia C; Smith, Maureen E; Trinidad, Susan Brown

    2013-10-01

    Integrating genomic information into clinical care and the electronic health record can facilitate personalized medicine through genetically guided clinical decision support. Stakeholder involvement is critical to the success of these implementation efforts. Prior work on implementation of clinical information systems provides broad guidance to inform effective engagement strategies. We add to this evidence-based recommendations that are specific to issues at the intersection of genomics and the electronic health record. We describe stakeholder engagement strategies employed by the Electronic Medical Records and Genomics Network, a national consortium of US research institutions funded by the National Human Genome Research Institute to develop, disseminate, and apply approaches that combine genomic and electronic health record data. Through select examples drawn from sites of the Electronic Medical Records and Genomics Network, we illustrate a continuum of engagement strategies to inform genomic integration into commercial and homegrown electronic health records across a range of health-care settings. We frame engagement as activities to consult, involve, and partner with key stakeholder groups throughout specific phases of health information technology implementation. Our aim is to provide insights into engagement strategies to guide genomic integration based on our unique network experiences and lessons learned within the broader context of implementation research in biomedical informatics. On the basis of our collective experience, we describe key stakeholder practices, challenges, and considerations for successful genomic integration to support personalized medicine.

  13. Exploring Factors Affecting Voluntary Adoption of Electronic Medical Records Among Physicians and Clinical Assistants of Small or Solo Private General Practice Clinics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Or, Calvin; Tong, Ellen; Tan, Joseph; Chan, Summer

    2018-05-29

    The health care reform initiative led by the Hong Kong government's Food and Health Bureau has started the implementation of an electronic sharing platform to provide an information infrastructure that enables public hospitals and private clinics to share their electronic medical records (EMRs) for improved access to patients' health care information. However, previous attempts to convince the private clinics to adopt EMRs to document health information have faced challenges, as the EMR adoption has been voluntary. The lack of electronic data shared by private clinics carries direct impacts to the efficacy of electronic record sharing between public and private healthcare providers. To increase the likelihood of buy-in, it is essential to proactively identify the users' and organizations' needs and capabilities before large-scale implementation. As part of the reform initiative, this study examined factors affecting the adoption of EMRs in small or solo private general practice clinics, by analyzing the experiences and opinions of the physicians and clinical assistants during the pilot implementation of the technology, with the purpose to learn from it before full-scale rollout. In-depth, semistructured interviews were conducted with 23 physicians and clinical assistants from seven small or solo private general practice clinics to evaluate their experiences, expectations, and opinions regarding the deployment of EMRs. Interview transcripts were content analyzed to identify key factors. Factors affecting the adoption of EMRs to record and manage health care information were identified as follows: system interface design; system functions; stability and reliability of hardware, software, and computing networks; financial and time costs; task and outcome performance, work practice, and clinical workflow; physical space in clinics; trust in technology; users' information technology literacy; training and technical support; and social and organizational influences. The

  14. Electronic health record tools' support of nurses' clinical judgment and team communication.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kossman, Susan P; Bonney, Leigh Ann; Kim, Myoung Jin

    2013-11-01

    Nurses need to quickly process information to form clinical judgments, communicate with the healthcare team, and guide optimal patient care. Electronic health records not only offer potential for enhanced care but also introduce unintended consequences through changes in workflow, clinical judgment, and communication. We investigated nurses' use of improvised (self-made) and electronic health record-generated cognitive artifacts on clinical judgment and team communication. Tanner's Clinical Judgment Model provided a framework and basis for questions in an online survey and focus group interviews. Findings indicated that (1) nurses rated self-made work lists and medication administration records highest for both clinical judgment and communication, (2) tools aided different dimensions of clinical judgment, and (3) interdisciplinary tools enhance team communication. Implications are that electronic health record tool redesign could better support nursing work.

  15. Developing an Interface to Order and Document Health Education Videos in the Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wojcik, Lauren

    2015-01-01

    Transitioning to electronic health records (EHRs) provides an opportunity for health care systems to integrate educational content available on interactive patient systems (IPS) with the medical documentation system. This column discusses how one hospital simplified providers' workflow by making it easier to order educational videos and ensure that completed education is documented within the medical record. Integrating the EHR and IPS streamlined the provision of patient education, improved documentation, and supported the organization in meeting core requirements for Meaningful Use.

  16. 77 FR 23193 - Medicare and Medicaid Programs; Electronic Health Record Incentive Program-Stage 2; Corrections

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-04-18

    ..., 413, and 495 [CMS-0044-CN] RIN 0938-AQ84 Medicare and Medicaid Programs; Electronic Health Record... proposed rule entitled ``Medicare and Medicaid Programs; Electronic Health Record Incentive Program--Stage... (77 FR 13698), the proposed rule entitled ``Medicare and Medicaid Programs; Electronic Health Record...

  17. Determinants of primary care nurses' intention to adopt an electronic health record in their clinical practice.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Leblanc, Genevieve; Gagnon, Marie-Pierre; Sanderson, Duncan

    2012-09-01

    A provincial electronic health record is being developed in the Province of Quebec (and in all other provinces in Canada), and authorities hope that it will enable a safer and more efficient healthcare system for citizens. However, the expected benefits can occur only if healthcare professionals, including nurses, adopt this technology. Although attention to the use of the electronic health record by nurses is growing, better understanding of nurses' intention to use an electronic health record is needed and could help managers to better plan its implementation. This study examined the factors that influence primary care nurses' intention to adopt the provincial electronic health record, since intention influences electronic health record use and implementation success. Using a modified version of Ajzen's Theory of Planned Theory of Planned Behavior, a questionnaire was developed and pretested. Questionnaires were distributed to 199 primary care nurses. Multiple hierarchical regression indicated that the Theory of Planned Behavior variables explained 58% of the variance in nurses' intention to adopt an electronic health record. The strong intention to adopt the electronic health record is mainly determined by perceived behavioral control, normative beliefs, and attitudes. The implications of the study are that healthcare managers could facilitate adoption of an electronic health record by strengthening nurses' intention to adopt the electronic health record, which in turn can be influenced through interventions oriented toward the belief that using an electronic health record will improve the quality of patient care.

  18. Innovative uses of electronic health records and social media for public health surveillance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Eggleston, Emma M; Weitzman, Elissa R

    2014-03-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) and social media have the potential to enrich public health surveillance of diabetes. Clinical and patient-facing data sources for diabetes surveillance are needed given its profound public health impact, opportunity for primary and secondary prevention, persistent disparities, and requirement for self-management. Initiatives to employ data from EHRs and social media for diabetes surveillance are in their infancy. With their transformative potential come practical limitations and ethical considerations. We explore applications of EHR and social media for diabetes surveillance, limitations to approaches, and steps for moving forward in this partnership between patients, health systems, and public health.

  19. 76 FR 40454 - Proposed Information Collection (VSO Access to VHA Electronic Health Records) Activity; Comment...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-07-08

    ... Access to VHA Electronic Health Records) Activity; Comment Request AGENCY: Veterans Health Administration... Access to VHA Electronic Health Records, VA Form 10- 0400. OMB Control Number: 2900-0710. Type of Review... were granted power of attorney by veterans who have medical information recorded in VHA electronic...

  20. Developing an electronic health record (EHR) for methadone treatment recording and decision support.

    LENUS (Irish Health Repository)

    Xiao, Liang

    2011-02-01

    In this paper, we give an overview of methadone treatment in Ireland and outline the rationale for designing an electronic health record (EHR) with extensibility, interoperability and decision support functionality. Incorporating several international standards, a conceptual model applying a problem orientated approach in a hierarchical structure has been proposed for building the EHR.

  1. Tracking official development assistance for reproductive health in conflict-affected countries.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Patel, Preeti; Roberts, Bayard; Guy, Samantha; Lee-Jones, Louise; Conteh, Lesong

    2009-06-09

    Reproductive health needs are particularly acute in countries affected by armed conflict. Reliable information on aid investment for reproductive health in these countries is essential for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of aid. The purpose of this study was to analyse official development assistance (ODA) for reproductive health activities in conflict-affected countries from 2003 to 2006. The Creditor Reporting System and the Financial Tracking System databases were the chosen data sources for the study. ODA disbursement for reproductive health activities to 18 conflict-affected countries was analysed for 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006. An average of US $20.8 billion in total ODA was disbursed annually to the 18 conflict-affected countries between 2003 and 2006, of which US $509.3 million (2.4%) was allocated to reproductive health. This represents an annual average of US $1.30 disbursed per capita in the 18 sampled countries for reproductive health activities. Non-conflict-affected least-developed countries received 53.3% more ODA for reproductive health activities than conflict-affected least-developed countries, despite the latter generally having greater reproductive health needs. ODA disbursed for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment increased by 119.4% from 2003 to 2006. The ODA disbursed for other direct reproductive health activities declined by 35.9% over the same period. This study provides evidence of inequity in disbursement of reproductive health ODA between conflict-affected countries and non-conflict-affected countries, and between different reproductive health activities. These findings and the study's recommendations seek to support initiatives to make aid financing more responsive to need in the context of armed conflict.

  2. Tracking official development assistance for reproductive health in conflict-affected countries.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Preeti Patel

    2009-06-01

    Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Reproductive health needs are particularly acute in countries affected by armed conflict. Reliable information on aid investment for reproductive health in these countries is essential for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of aid. The purpose of this study was to analyse official development assistance (ODA for reproductive health activities in conflict-affected countries from 2003 to 2006. METHODS AND FINDINGS: The Creditor Reporting System and the Financial Tracking System databases were the chosen data sources for the study. ODA disbursement for reproductive health activities to 18 conflict-affected countries was analysed for 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006. An average of US $20.8 billion in total ODA was disbursed annually to the 18 conflict-affected countries between 2003 and 2006, of which US $509.3 million (2.4% was allocated to reproductive health. This represents an annual average of US $1.30 disbursed per capita in the 18 sampled countries for reproductive health activities. Non-conflict-affected least-developed countries received 53.3% more ODA for reproductive health activities than conflict-affected least-developed countries, despite the latter generally having greater reproductive health needs. ODA disbursed for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment increased by 119.4% from 2003 to 2006. The ODA disbursed for other direct reproductive health activities declined by 35.9% over the same period. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides evidence of inequity in disbursement of reproductive health ODA between conflict-affected countries and non-conflict-affected countries, and between different reproductive health activities. These findings and the study's recommendations seek to support initiatives to make aid financing more responsive to need in the context of armed conflict.

  3. HEALTH RECORDS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN SUPPORT OF EXCHANGE OF HEALTH INFORMATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jordan Deliversky

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available The exchange of health information in conditions directly related to electronic environment is referred as health information technology. Usually the protection of personal health related data is comprised of various elements such as ways of information usage and access to sensitive health information. The protection of individually identifiable health information is possible with combination of measures. Protective measures include administrative, technical and physical elements. Through such protective measures is possible to ensure confidentiality, integrity and availability of the information, while at the same time could be guaranteed the prevention of unauthorized access. Sensitive records usually contain personal health information. Personal medical data requires high level of protection, as its content includes medical condition or diagnosis, where unauthorized access could have negative impact on one’s personal and professional life.

  4. Platform links clinical data with electronic health records

    Science.gov (United States)

    To make data gathered from patients in clinical trials available for use in standard care, NCI has created a new computer tool to support interoperability between clinical research and electronic health record systems. This new software represents an inno

  5. Progress along developmental tracks for electronic health records implementation in the United States

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hollar David W

    2009-03-01

    Full Text Available Abstract The development and implementation of electronic health records (EHR have occurred slowly in the United States. To date, these approaches have, for the most part, followed four developmental tracks: (a Enhancement of immunization registries and linkage with other health records to produce Child Health Profiles (CHP, (b Regional Health Information Organization (RHIO demonstration projects to link together patient medical records, (c Insurance company projects linked to ICD-9 codes and patient records for cost-benefit assessments, and (d Consortia of EHR developers collaborating to model systems requirements and standards for data linkage. Until recently, these separate efforts have been conducted in the very silos that they had intended to eliminate, and there is still considerable debate concerning health professionals access to as well as commitment to using EHR if these systems are provided. This paper will describe these four developmental tracks, patient rights and the legal environment for EHR, international comparisons, and future projections for EHR expansion across health networks in the United States.

  6. CrowdHEALTH: Holistic Health Records and Big Data Analytics for Health Policy Making and Personalized Health.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kyriazis, Dimosthenis; Autexier, Serge; Brondino, Iván; Boniface, Michael; Donat, Lucas; Engen, Vegard; Fernandez, Rafael; Jimenez-Peris, Ricardo; Jordan, Blanca; Jurak, Gregor; Kiourtis, Athanasios; Kosmidis, Thanos; Lustrek, Mitja; Maglogiannis, Ilias; Mantas, John; Martinez, Antonio; Mavrogiorgou, Argyro; Menychtas, Andreas; Montandon, Lydia; Nechifor, Cosmin-Septimiu; Nifakos, Sokratis; Papageorgiou, Alexandra; Patino-Martinez, Marta; Perez, Manuel; Plagianakos, Vassilis; Stanimirovic, Dalibor; Starc, Gregor; Tomson, Tanja; Torelli, Francesco; Traver-Salcedo, Vicente; Vassilacopoulos, George; Wajid, Usman

    2017-01-01

    Today's rich digital information environment is characterized by the multitude of data sources providing information that has not yet reached its full potential in eHealth. The aim of the presented approach, namely CrowdHEALTH, is to introduce a new paradigm of Holistic Health Records (HHRs) that include all health determinants. HHRs are transformed into HHRs clusters capturing the clinical, social and human context of population segments and as a result collective knowledge for different factors. The proposed approach also seamlessly integrates big data technologies across the complete data path, providing of Data as a Service (DaaS) to the health ecosystem stakeholders, as well as to policy makers towards a "health in all policies" approach. Cross-domain co-creation of policies is feasible through a rich toolkit, being provided on top of the DaaS, incorporating mechanisms for causal and risk analysis, and for the compilation of predictions.

  7. A shared electronic health record: lessons from the coalface.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Silvester, Brett V; Carr, Simon J

    2009-06-01

    A shared electronic health record system has been successfully implemented in Australia by a Division of General Practice in northern Brisbane. The system grew out of coordinated care trials that showed the critical need to share summary patient information, particularly for patients with complex conditions who require the services of a wide range of multisector, multidisciplinary health care professionals. As at 30 April 2008, connected users of the system included 239 GPs from 66 general practices, two major public hospitals, three large private hospitals, 11 allied health and community-based provider organisations and 1108 registered patients. Access data showed a patient's shared record was accessed an average of 15 times over a 12-month period. The success of the Brisbane implementation relied on seven key factors: connectivity, interoperability, change management, clinical leadership, targeted patient involvement, information at the point of care, and governance. The Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care is currently evaluating the system for its potential to reduce errors relating to inadequate information transfer during clinical handover.

  8. Using data from ambient assisted living and smart homes in electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Knaup, P; Schöpe, L

    2014-01-01

    This editorial is part of the Focus Theme of Methods of Information in Medicine on "Using Data from Ambient Assisted Living and Smart Homes in Electronic Health Records". To increase efficiency in the health care of the future, data from innovative technology like it is used for ambient assisted living (AAL) or smart homes should be available for individual health decisions. Integrating and aggregating data from different medical devices and health records enables a comprehensive view on health data. The objective of this paper is to present examples of the state of the art in research on information management that leads to a sustainable use and long-term storage of health data provided by innovative assistive technologies in daily living. Current research deals with the perceived usefulness of sensor data, the participatory design of visual displays for presenting monitoring data, and communication architectures for integrating sensor data from home health care environments with health care providers either via a regional health record bank or via a telemedical center. Integrating data from AAL systems and smart homes with data from electronic patient or health records is still in an early stage. Several projects are in an advanced conceptual phase, some of them exploring feasibility with the help of prototypes. General comprehensive solutions are hardly available and should become a major issue of medical informatics research in the near future.

  9. Willingness to share personal health record data for care improvement and public health: a survey of experienced personal health record users

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Weitzman Elissa R

    2012-05-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Data stored in personally controlled health records (PCHRs may hold value for clinicians and public health entities, if patients and their families will share them. We sought to characterize consumer willingness and unwillingness (reticence to share PCHR data across health topics, and with different stakeholders, to advance understanding of this issue. Methods Cross-sectional 2009 Web survey of repeat PCHR users who were patients over 18 years old or parents of patients, to assess willingness to share their PCHR data with an-out-of-hospital provider to support care, and the state/local public health authority to support monitoring; the odds of reticence to share PCHR information about ten exemplary health topics were estimated using a repeated measures approach. Results Of 261 respondents (56% response rate, more reported they would share all information with the state/local public health authority (63.3% than with an out-of-hospital provider (54.1% (OR 1.5, 95% CI 1.1, 1.9; p = .005; few would not share any information with these parties (respectively, 7.9% and 5.2%. For public health sharing, reticence was higher for most topics compared to contagious illness (ORs 4.9 to 1.4, all p-values  Conclusions Pediatric patients and their families are often willing to share electronic health information to support health improvement, but remain cautious. Robust trust models for PCHR sharing are needed.

  10. Information security risk measures for cloud-based personal health records

    CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

    Mxoli, A

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available Personal Health Records (PHRs) provide a convenient way for individuals to better manage their health. With the advancement in technology, they can be stored via Cloud Computing. These are pay-per-use applications offered as a service over...

  11. Changes to Workflow and Process Measures in the PICU During Transition From Semi to Full Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Salib, Mina; Hoffmann, Raymond G; Dasgupta, Mahua; Zimmerman, Haydee; Hanson, Sheila

    2015-10-01

    Studies showing the changes in workflow during transition from semi to full electronic medical records are lacking. This objective study is to identify the changes in workflow in the PICU during transition from semi to full electronic health record. Prospective observational study. Children's Hospital of Wisconsin Institutional Review Board waived the need for approval so this study was institutional review board exempt. This study measured clinical workflow variables at a 72-bed PICU during different phases of transition to a full electronic health record, which occurred on November 4, 2012. Phases of electronic health record transition were defined as follows: pre-electronic health record (baseline data prior to transition to full electronic health record), transition phase (3 wk after electronic health record), and stabilization (6 mo after electronic health record). Data were analyzed for the three phases using Mann-Whitney U test with a two-sided p value of less than 0.05 considered significant. Seventy-two bed PICU. All patients in the PICU were included during the study periods. Five hundred and sixty-four patients with 2,355 patient days were evaluated in the three phases. Duration of rounds decreased from a median of 9 minutes per patient pre--electronic health record to 7 minutes per patient post electronic health record. Time to final note decreased from 2.06 days pre--electronic health record to 0.5 days post electronic health record. Time to first medication administration after admission also decreased from 33 minutes pre--electronic health record and 7 minutes post electronic health record. Time to Time to medication reconciliation was significantly higher pre-electronic health record than post electronic health record and percent of medication reconciliation completion was significantly lower pre--electronic health record than post electronic health record and percent of medication reconciliation completion was significantly higher pre

  12. The Importance of the Medical Record: A Critical Professional Responsibility.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ngo, Elizabeth; Patel, Nachiket; Chandrasekaran, Krishnaswamy; Tajik, A Jamil; Paterick, Timothy E

    2016-01-01

    Comprehensive, detailed documentation in the medical record is critical to patient care and to a physician when allegations of negligence arise. Physicians, therefore, would be prudent to have a clear understanding of this documentation. It is important to understand who is responsible for documentation, what is important to document, when to document, and how to document. Additionally, it should be understood who owns the medical record, the significance of the transition to the electronic medical record, problems and pitfalls when using the electronic medical record, and how the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act affects healthcare providers and health information technology.

  13. The role of affect in consumer evaluation of health care services.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ng, Sandy; Russell-Bennett, Rebekah

    2015-01-01

    Health care services are typically consumed out of necessity, typically to recover from illness. While the consumption of health care services can be emotional given that consumers experience fear, hope, relief, and joy, surprisingly, there is little research on the role of consumer affect in health care consumption. We propose that consumer affect is a heuristic cue that drives evaluation of health care services. Drawing from cognitive appraisal theory and affect-as-information theory, this article tests a research model (N = 492) that investigates consumer affect resulting from service performance on subsequent service outcomes.

  14. Parental access to minors' health records in the South African health care context: concerns and recommendations

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    MN Slabbert

    2004-10-01

    Full Text Available Privacy and confidentiality have long been recognized as essential elements of the doctor-patient relationship. Patients should feel free to disclose the most intimate and private medical facts about themselves to their physicians in order to facilitate optimal patient care. Medical records, whether hand-written or electronic, also play an important role in other contexts, such as medical research, health care management and financial audit. In South Africa there is little consistency in approaches to patient confidentiality. There are also no national standards or policies on patient confidentiality, apart from specific ethical rules, some ad hoc statutory provisions and general constitutional provisions not directly related to the intricacies of the doctor-patient relationship. A closer look at the relevant statutory provisions reveal the existence of conflicting standards, most notably in respect of parental access to a minors' health records. The purpose of this paper is to examine the discrepancies and contradictory provisions relating to the access to and disclosure of health information, in particular parental access to health records of minors. In the final instance, some recommendations will be suggested.

  15. Electronic health records to support obesity-related patient care: Results from a survey of United States physicians.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bronder, Kayla L; Dooyema, Carrie A; Onufrak, Stephen J; Foltz, Jennifer L

    2015-08-01

    Obesity-related electronic health record functions increase the rates of measuring Body Mass Index, diagnosing obesity, and providing obesity services. This study describes the prevalence of obesity-related electronic health record functions in clinical practice and analyzes characteristics associated with increased obesity-related electronic health record sophistication. Data were analyzed from DocStyles, a web-based panel survey administered to 1507 primary care providers practicing in the United States in June, 2013. Physicians were asked if their electronic health record has specific obesity-related functions. Logistical regression analyses identified characteristics associated with improved obesity-related electronic health record sophistication. Of the 88% of providers with an electronic health record, 83% of electronic health records calculate Body Mass Index, 52% calculate pediatric Body Mass Index percentile, and 32% flag patients with abnormal Body Mass Index values. Only 36% provide obesity-related decision support and 17% suggest additional resources for obesity-related care. Characteristics associated with having a more sophisticated electronic health record include age ≤45years old, being a pediatrician or family practitioner, and practicing in a larger, outpatient practice. Few electronic health records optimally supported physician's obesity-related clinical care. The low rates of obesity-related electronic health record functions currently in practice highlight areas to improve the clinical health information technology in primary care practice. More work can be done to develop, implement, and promote the effective utilization of obesity-related electronic health record functions to improve obesity treatment and prevention efforts. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  16. Personal health records as portal to the electronic medical record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cahill, Jennifer E; Gilbert, Mark R; Armstrong, Terri S

    2014-03-01

    This topic review discusses the evolving clinical challenges associated with the implementation of electronic personal health records (PHR) that are fully integrated with electronic medical records (EMR). The benefits of facilitating patient access to the EMR through web-based, PHR-portals may be substantial; foremost is the potential to enhance the flow of information between patient and healthcare practitioner. The benefits of improved communication and transparency of care are presumed to be a reduction in clinical errors, increased quality of care, better patient-management of disease, and better disease and symptom comprehension. Yet PHR databases allow patients open access to newly-acquired clinical data without the benefit of concurrent expert clinical interpretation, and therefore may create the potential for greater patient distress and uncertainty. With specific attention to neuro-oncology patients, this review focuses on the developing conflicts and consequences associated with the use of a PHR that parallels data acquisition of the EMR in real-time. We conclude with a discussion of recommendations for implementing fully-integrated PHR for neuro-oncology patients.

  17. The Challenges of Electronic Health Records and Diabetes Electronic Prescribing: Implications for Safety Net Care for Diverse Populations

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Neda Ratanawongsa

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Widespread electronic health record (EHR implementation creates new challenges in the diabetes care of complex and diverse populations, including safe medication prescribing for patients with limited health literacy and limited English proficiency. This review highlights how the EHR electronic prescribing transformation has affected diabetes care for vulnerable patients and offers recommendations for improving patient safety through EHR electronic prescribing design, implementation, policy, and research. Specifically, we present evidence for (1 the adoption of RxNorm; (2 standardized naming and picklist options for high alert medications such as insulin; (3 the widespread implementation of universal medication schedule and language-concordant labels, with the expansion of electronic prescription 140-character limit; (4 enhanced bidirectional communication with pharmacy partners; and (5 informatics and implementation research in safety net healthcare systems to examine how EHR tools and practices affect diverse vulnerable populations.

  18. Development of archetypes of radiology for electronic health record

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Araujo, Tiago V.; Pires, Silvio R.; Paiva, Paulo B.

    2013-01-01

    This paper presents a proposal to develop archetypes for electronic patient records system based the openEHR Foundation model. Archetypes were developed specifically for the areas of radiology and diagnostic imaging, as for the early implementation of an electronic health records system. The archetypes developed are related to the examinations request, their execution and report, corresponding to both the administrative as diagnostic workflow inside a diagnostic imaging sector. (author)

  19. Personal Health Records: Design considerations for the South African context

    CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

    Mxoli, A

    2014-09-01

    Full Text Available A Personal Health Record (PHR) is a set of internet-based tools that allow individuals to create, store and coordinate their lifelong health information in one place making it available to relevant parties. It typically contains the individual’s...

  20. Electronic health records challenges in design and implementation

    CERN Document Server

    Sittig, Dean F

    2013-01-01

    This book provides an overview of the challenges in electronic health records (EHR) design and implementation along with an introduction to the best practices that have been identified over the past several years. The book examines concerns surrounding EHR use and proposes eight examples of proper EHR use. It discusses the complex strategic planning that accompanies the systemic organizational changes associated with EHR programs and highlights key lessons learned regarding health information-including technology errors and risk management concerns.

  1. Defining and incorporating basic nursing care actions into the electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Englebright, Jane; Aldrich, Kelly; Taylor, Cathy R

    2014-01-01

    To develop a definition of basic nursing care for the hospitalized adult patient and drive uptake of that definition through the implementation of an electronic health record. A team of direct care nurses, assisted by subject matter experts, analyzed nursing theory and regulatory requirements related to basic nursing care. The resulting list of activities was coded using the Clinical Care Classification (CCC) system and incorporated into the electronic health record system of a 170-bed community hospital. Nine basic nursing care activities were identified as a result of analyzing nursing theory and regulatory requirements in the framework of a hypothetical "well" patient. One additional basic nursing care activity was identified following the pilot implementation in the electronic health record. The pilot hospital has successfully passed a post-implementation regulatory review with no recommendations related to the documentation of basic patient care. This project demonstrated that it is possible to define the concept of basic nursing care and to distinguish it from the interdisciplinary, problem-focused plan of care. The use of the electronic health record can help clarify, document, and communicate basic care elements and improve uptake among nurses. This project to define basic nursing care activities and incorporate into the electronic health record represents a first step in capturing meaningful data elements. When fully implemented, these data could be translated into knowledge for improving care outcomes and collaborative processes. © 2013 Sigma Theta Tau International.

  2. De-identification of unstructured paper-based health records for privacy-preserving secondary use.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fenz, Stefan; Heurix, Johannes; Neubauer, Thomas; Rella, Antonio

    2014-07-01

    Abstract Whenever personal data is processed, privacy is a serious issue. Especially in the document-centric e-health area, the patients' privacy must be preserved in order to prevent any negative repercussions for the patient. Clinical research, for example, demands structured health records to carry out efficient clinical trials, whereas legislation (e.g. HIPAA) regulates that only de-identified health records may be used for research. However, unstructured and often paper-based data dominates information technology, especially in the healthcare sector. Existing approaches are geared towards data in English-language documents only and have not been designed to handle the recognition of erroneous personal data which is the result of the OCR-based digitization of paper-based health records.

  3. A qualitative study of factors affecting mental health amongst low-income working mothers in Bangalore, India.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Travasso, Sandra Mary; Rajaraman, Divya; Heymann, Sally Jody

    2014-02-07

    Low-income urban working mothers face many challenges in their domestic, environmental, and working conditions that may affect their mental health. In India, a high prevalence of mental health disorders has been recorded in young women, but there has been little research to examine the factors that affect their mental health at home and work. Through a primarily qualitative approach, we studied the relationship between work, caring for family, spousal support, stress relief strategies and mental health amongst forty eight low-income working mothers residing in urban slums across Bangalore, India. Participants were construction workers, domestic workers, factory workers and fruit and vegetable street vendors. Qualitative data analysis themes included state of mental health, factors that affected mental health positively or negatively, manifestations and consequences of stress and depression, and stress mitigators. Even in our small sample of women, we found evidence of extreme depression, including suicidal ideation and attempted suicide. Women who have an alcoholic and/or abusive husband, experience intimate partner violence, are raising children with special needs, and lack adequate support for child care appear to be more susceptible to severe and prolonged periods of depression and suicide attempts. Factors that pointed towards reduced anxiety and depression were social support from family, friends and colleagues and fulfilment from work. This qualitative study raises concerns that low-income working mothers in urban areas in India are at high risk for depression, and identifies common factors that create and mitigate stress in this population group. We discuss implications of the findings for supporting the mental health of urban working women in the Indian context. The development of the national mental health policy in India and its subsequent implementation should draw on existing research documenting factors associated with negative mental health amongst

  4. Ideal affect in daily life: implications for affective experience, health, and social behavior.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tsai, Jeanne L

    2017-10-01

    Over the last decade, researchers have increasingly demonstrated that ideal affect-the affective states that people value and ideally want to feel-shapes different aspects of daily life. Here I briefly review Affect Valuation Theory (AVT), which integrates ideal affect into existing models of affect and emotion by identifying the causes and consequences of variation in ideal affect. I then describe recent research that applies AVT to the valuation of negative states as well as more complex states, examines how ideal affect shapes momentary affective experience, suggests that ideal affect has both direct and indirect effects on health, and illustrates that people's ideal affect shapes how they judge and respond to others. Finally, I discuss the implications of cultural and individual differences in ideal affect for clinical, educational, work, and leisure settings. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  5. Mining Electronic Health Records Data: Domestic Violence and Adverse Health Effects.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Karakurt, Gunnur; Patel, Vishal; Whiting, Kathleen; Koyutürk, Mehmet

    2017-01-01

    Intimate partner violence (IPV) often culminates in acute physical injury, sexual assault, and mental health issues. It is crucial to understand the healthcare habits of victims to develop interventions that can drastically improve a victim's quality of life and prevent future abuse. The objective of this study is to mine de-identified and aggregated Electronic Health Record data to identify women's health issues that are potentially associated with IPV. In this study we compared health issues of female domestic abuse victims to female non-domestic abuse victims. The Domestic abuse population contained 5870 patients, while the Non-Domestic Abuse population contained 14,315,140 patients. Explorys provides National Big Data from the entire USA. Statistical analysis identified 2429 terms as significantly more prevalent among victims of domestic abuse, compared to the general population. These terms were classified into broad categories, including acute injury, chronic conditions, substance abuse, mental health, disorders, gynecological and pregnancy related problems.

  6. A consumer health record for supporting the patient-centered management of chronic diseases

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    de Clercq, Paul A.; Hasman, Arie; Wolffenbuttel, Bruce H. R.

    2003-01-01

    OBJECTIVES: To design and implement a shareable consumer health record system to investigate whether the system can assist in the management of chronic diseases. METHODS: A toolkit was designed for constructing the consumer health record system in an evolutionary way. An ethnographic-like approach

  7. A consumer health record for supporting the patient-centered management of chronic diseases

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Clercq, de P.A.; Hasman, A.; Wolffenbuttel, B.H.R.

    2003-01-01

    Objectives : To design and implement a shareable consumer health record system to investigate whether the system can assist in the management of chronic diseases. Methods : A toolkit was designed for constructing the consumer health record system in an evolutionary way. An ethnographic-like approach

  8. A consumer health record for supporting the patient-centered management of chronic diseases

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    De Clercq, Paul A; Hasman, Arie; Wolffenbuttel, Bruce H R

    Objectives : To design and implement a shareable consumer health record system to investigate whether the system can assist in the management of chronic diseases. Methods : A toolkit was designed for constructing the consumer health record system in an evolutionary way. An ethnographic-like approach

  9. Using electronic health records to save money.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bar-Dayan, Yosefa; Saed, Halil; Boaz, Mona; Misch, Yehudith; Shahar, Talia; Husiascky, Ilan; Blumenfeld, Oren

    2013-06-01

    Health information technology, especially electronic health records (EHRs), can be used to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare providers. This study assessed the cost-savings of incorporating a list of preferred specialty care providers into the EHRs used by all primary care physicians (PCPs), accompanied by a comprehensive implementation plan. On January 1, 2005, all specialty clinic providers at the Israeli Defense Forces were divided into one of four financial classes based on their charges, class 1, the least expensive, being the most preferred, followed by classes 2-4. This list was incorporated into the EHRs used by all PCPs in primary care clinics. PCPs received comprehensive training. Target referral goals were determined for each class and measured for 4 years, together with the total cost of all specialist visits in the first year compared to the following years. Quality assessment (QA) scores were used as a measure of the program's effect on the quality of patient care. During 2005-2008, a marginally significant decline in referrals to class 1 was observed (r=-0.254, p=0.078), however a significant increase in referral rates to class 2 was observed (r=0.957, p=0.042), concurrent with a decrease in referral rates to classes 3 and 4 (r=-0.312, p=0.024). An inverse correlation was observed between year and total costs for all visits to specialists (2008 prices; r=-0.96, p=0.04), and between the mean cost of one specialist visit over the 4 years, indicating a significant reduction in real costs (2008 prices; r=-0.995, p=0.005). QA was not affected by these changes (r=0.94, p=0.016). From a policy perspective, our data suggest that EHR can facilitate effective utilization of healthcare providers and decrease costs.

  10. The REporting of studies Conducted using Observational Routinely-collected health Data (RECORD statement.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eric I Benchimol

    2015-10-01

    Full Text Available Routinely collected health data, obtained for administrative and clinical purposes without specific a priori research goals, are increasingly used for research. The rapid evolution and availability of these data have revealed issues not addressed by existing reporting guidelines, such as Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE. The REporting of studies Conducted using Observational Routinely collected health Data (RECORD statement was created to fill these gaps. RECORD was created as an extension to the STROBE statement to address reporting items specific to observational studies using routinely collected health data. RECORD consists of a checklist of 13 items related to the title, abstract, introduction, methods, results, and discussion section of articles, and other information required for inclusion in such research reports. This document contains the checklist and explanatory and elaboration information to enhance the use of the checklist. Examples of good reporting for each RECORD checklist item are also included herein. This document, as well as the accompanying website and message board (http://www.record-statement.org, will enhance the implementation and understanding of RECORD. Through implementation of RECORD, authors, journals editors, and peer reviewers can encourage transparency of research reporting.

  11. Designing a patient-centered personal health record to promote preventive care

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Krist Alex H

    2011-11-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Evidence-based preventive services offer profound health benefits, yet Americans receive only half of indicated care. A variety of government and specialty society policy initiatives are promoting the adoption of information technologies to engage patients in their care, such as personal health records, but current systems may not utilize the technology's full potential. Methods Using a previously described model to make information technology more patient-centered, we developed an interactive preventive health record (IPHR designed to more deeply engage patients in preventive care and health promotion. We recruited 14 primary care practices to promote the IPHR to all adult patients and sought practice and patient input in designing the IPHR to ensure its usability, salience, and generalizability. The input involved patient usability tests, practice workflow observations, learning collaboratives, and patient feedback. Use of the IPHR was measured using practice appointment and IPHR databases. Results The IPHR that emerged from this process generates tailored patient recommendations based on guidelines from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force and other organizations. It extracts clinical data from the practices' electronic medical record and obtains health risk assessment information from patients. Clinical content is translated and explained in lay language. Recommendations review the benefits and uncertainties of services and possible actions for patients and clinicians. Embedded in recommendations are self management tools, risk calculators, decision aids, and community resources - selected to match patient's clinical circumstances. Within six months, practices had encouraged 14.4% of patients to use the IPHR (ranging from 1.5% to 28.3% across the 14 practices. Practices successfully incorporated the IPHR into workflow, using it to prepare patients for visits, augment health behavior counseling, explain test results

  12. Are personal health records safe? A review of free web-accessible personal health record privacy policies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Carrión Señor, Inmaculada; Fernández-Alemán, José Luis; Toval, Ambrosio

    2012-08-23

    Several obstacles prevent the adoption and use of personal health record (PHR) systems, including users' concerns regarding the privacy and security of their personal health information. To analyze the privacy and security characteristics of PHR privacy policies. It is hoped that identification of the strengths and weaknesses of the PHR systems will be useful for PHR users, health care professionals, decision makers, and designers. We conducted a systematic review using the principal databases related to health and computer science to discover the Web-based and free PHR systems mentioned in published articles. The privacy policy of each PHR system selected was reviewed to extract its main privacy and security characteristics. The search of databases and the myPHR website provided a total of 52 PHR systems, of which 24 met our inclusion criteria. Of these, 17 (71%) allowed users to manage their data and to control access to their health care information. Only 9 (38%) PHR systems permitted users to check who had accessed their data. The majority of PHR systems used information related to the users' accesses to monitor and analyze system use, 12 (50%) of them aggregated user information to publish trends, and 20 (83%) used diverse types of security measures. Finally, 15 (63%) PHR systems were based on regulations or principles such as the US Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the Health on the Net Foundation Code of Conduct (HONcode). Most privacy policies of PHR systems do not provide an in-depth description of the security measures that they use. Moreover, compliance with standards and regulations in PHR systems is still low.

  13. Can Social Cognitive Theories Help Us Understand Nurses' Use of Electronic Health Records?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Strudwick, Gillian; Booth, Richard; Mistry, Kartini

    2016-04-01

    Electronic health record implementations have accelerated in clinical settings around the world in an effort to improve patient safety and enhance efficiencies related to care delivery. As the largest group of healthcare professionals globally, nurses play an important role in the use of these records and ensuring their benefits are realized. Social cognitive theories such as the Theory of Reasoned Action, Theory of Planned Behaviour, and the Technology Acceptance Model have been developed to explain behavior. Given that variation in nurses' electronic health record utilization may influence the degree to which benefits are realized, the aim of this article is to explore how the use of these social cognitive theories may assist organizations implementing electronic health records to facilitate deeper-level adoption of this type of clinical technology.

  14. Implementing Electronic Health Record Default Settings to Reduce Opioid Overprescribing: A Pilot Study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zivin, Kara; White, Jessica O; Chao, Sandra; Christensen, Anna L; Horner, Luke; Petersen, Dana M; Hobbs, Morgan R; Capreol, Grace; Halbritter, Kevin A; Jones, Christopher M

    2018-01-09

    To pilot test the effectiveness, feasibility, and acceptability of instituting a 15-pill quantity default in the electronic health record for new Schedule II opioid prescriptions. A mixed-methods pilot study in two health systems, including pre-post analysis of prescribed opioid quantity and focus groups or interviews with prescribers and health system administrators. We implemented a 15-pill electronic health record default for new Schedule II opioids and assessed opioid quantity before and after implementation using electronic health record data on 6,390 opioid prescriptions from 448 prescribers. We then analyzed themes from focus groups and interviews with four staff members and six prescribers. The proportion of opioid prescriptions for 15 pills increased at both sites after adding an electronic health record default, with one reaching statistical significance (from 4.1% to 7.2% at CHC, P = 0.280, and 15.9% to 37.2% at WVU, P default, although ease of implementation varied by electronic health record vendor. Most prescribers were not aware of the default change and stated that they made prescribing decisions based on patient clinical characteristics rather than defaults. This pilot provides initial evidence that changing default settings can increase the number of prescriptions at the default level. This low-cost and relatively simple intervention could have an impact on opioid overprescribing. However, default settings should be selected carefully to avoid unintended consequences. © 2018 American Academy of Pain Medicine. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com

  15. Dynamic modeling of patient and physician eye gaze to understand the effects of electronic health records on doctor-patient communication and attention.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Montague, Enid; Asan, Onur

    2014-03-01

    The aim of this study was to examine eye gaze patterns between patients and physicians while electronic health records were used to support patient care. Eye gaze provides an indication of physician attention to patient, patient/physician interaction, and physician behaviors such as searching for information and documenting information. A field study was conducted where 100 patient visits were observed and video recorded in a primary care clinic. Videos were then coded for gaze behaviors where patients' and physicians' gaze at each other and artifacts such as electronic health records were coded using a pre-established objective coding scheme. Gaze data were then analyzed using lag sequential methods. Results showed that there are several eye gaze patterns significantly dependent to each other. All doctor-initiated gaze patterns were followed by patient gaze patterns. Some patient-initiated gaze patterns were also followed by doctor gaze patterns significantly unlike the findings in previous studies. Health information technology appears to contribute to some of the new significant patterns that have emerged. Differences were also found in gaze patterns related to technology that differ from patterns identified in studies with paper charts. Several sequences related to patient-doctor-technology were also significant. Electronic health records affect the patient-physician eye contact dynamic differently than paper charts. This study identified several patterns of patient-physician interaction with electronic health record systems. Consistent with previous studies, physician initiated gaze is an important driver of the interactions between patient and physician and patient and technology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.

  16. Abstracting ICU Nursing Care Quality Data From the Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Seaman, Jennifer B; Evans, Anna C; Sciulli, Andrea M; Barnato, Amber E; Sereika, Susan M; Happ, Mary Beth

    2017-09-01

    The electronic health record is a potentially rich source of data for clinical research in the intensive care unit setting. We describe the iterative, multi-step process used to develop and test a data abstraction tool, used for collection of nursing care quality indicators from the electronic health record, for a pragmatic trial. We computed Cohen's kappa coefficient (κ) to assess interrater agreement or reliability of data abstracted using preliminary and finalized tools. In assessing the reliability of study data ( n = 1,440 cases) using the finalized tool, 108 randomly selected cases (10% of first half sample; 5% of last half sample) were independently abstracted by a second rater. We demonstrated mean κ values ranging from 0.61 to 0.99 for all indicators. Nursing care quality data can be accurately and reliably abstracted from the electronic health records of intensive care unit patients using a well-developed data collection tool and detailed training.

  17. Enabling Patient Control of Personal Electronic Health Records Through Distributed Ledger Technology.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cunningham, James; Ainsworth, John

    2017-01-01

    The rise of distributed ledger technology, initiated and exemplified by the Bitcoin blockchain, is having an increasing impact on information technology environments in which there is an emphasis on trust and security. Management of electronic health records, where both conformation to legislative regulations and maintenance of public trust are paramount, is an area where the impact of these new technologies may be particularly beneficial. We present a system that enables fine-grained personalized control of third-party access to patients' electronic health records, allowing individuals to specify when and how their records are accessed for research purposes. The use of the smart contract based Ethereum blockchain technology to implement this system allows it to operate in a verifiably secure, trustless, and openly auditable environment, features crucial to health information systems moving forward.

  18. Assessing electronic health record systems in emergency departments: Using a decision analytic Bayesian model.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ben-Assuli, Ofir; Leshno, Moshe

    2016-09-01

    In the last decade, health providers have implemented information systems to improve accuracy in medical diagnosis and decision-making. This article evaluates the impact of an electronic health record on emergency department physicians' diagnosis and admission decisions. A decision analytic approach using a decision tree was constructed to model the admission decision process to assess the added value of medical information retrieved from the electronic health record. Using a Bayesian statistical model, this method was evaluated on two coronary artery disease scenarios. The results show that the cases of coronary artery disease were better diagnosed when the electronic health record was consulted and led to more informed admission decisions. Furthermore, the value of medical information required for a specific admission decision in emergency departments could be quantified. The findings support the notion that physicians and patient healthcare can benefit from implementing electronic health record systems in emergency departments. © The Author(s) 2015.

  19. The adolescence of electronic health records: Status and perspectives for large scale implementation

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Andreas Drauschke

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available Health informatics started to evolve decades ago with the intention to support healthcare using computers. Since then Electronic health records (EHRs and personal health records (PHRs have become available but widespread adoption was limited by lack of interoperability and security issues. This paper discusses the feasibility of interoperable standards based EHRs and PHRs drawing on experience from implementation projects. It outlines challenges and goals in education and implementation for the next years.

  20. Electronic Health Record-Driven Workflow for Diagnostic Radiologists.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Geeslin, Matthew G; Gaskin, Cree M

    2016-01-01

    In most settings, radiologists maintain a high-throughput practice in which efficiency is crucial. The conversion from film-based to digital study interpretation and data storage launched the era of PACS-driven workflow, leading to significant gains in speed. The advent of electronic health records improved radiologists' access to patient data; however, many still find this aspect of workflow to be relatively cumbersome. Nevertheless, the ability to guide a diagnostic interpretation with clinical information, beyond that provided in the examination indication, can add significantly to the specificity of a radiologist's interpretation. Responsibilities of the radiologist include, but are not limited to, protocoling examinations, interpreting studies, chart review, peer review, writing notes, placing orders, and communicating with referring providers. Most of the aforementioned activities are not PACS-centric and require a login to one or more additional applications. Consolidation of these tasks for completion through a single interface can simplify workflow, save time, and potentially reduce the incidence of errors. Here, the authors describe diagnostic radiology workflow that leverages the electronic health record to significantly add to a radiologist's ability to be part of the health care team, provide relevant interpretations, and improve efficiency and quality. Copyright © 2016 American College of Radiology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  1. An Enterprise Architecture Perspective to Electronic Health Record Based Care Governance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Motoc, Bogdan

    2017-01-01

    This paper proposes an Enterprise Architecture viewpoint of Electronic Health Record (EHR) based care governance. The improvements expected are derived from the collaboration framework and the clinical health model proposed as foundation for the concept of EHR.

  2. Current patient and healthcare worker attitudes to eHealth and the personally controlled electronic health record in major hospitals.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Armani, R; Mitchell, L E; Allen-Graham, J; Heriot, N R; Kotsimbos, T; Wilson, J W

    2016-06-01

    The current health system in Australia is comprised of both electronic- and paper-based medical records. The Federal Government has approved funding for the development of an individual health identifier and a universally adopted online health repository. To determine attitudes and beliefs of patients and healthcare workers regarding the use of stored medical information and the personally controlled electronic health record (PCEHR) in selected major hospitals in Victoria. Qualitative survey of patients and healthcare workers (n = 600 each group) conducted during 2014 across five major hospitals in Melbourne to measure the awareness, attitudes and barriers to electronic health and the PCEHR. Of the patients, 93.3% support the concept of a shared electronic healthcare record, 33.7% were aware of the PCEHR and only 11% had registered. The majority of healthcare workers believed that the presence of a shared health record would result in an increased appropriateness of care and patient safety by reducing adverse drug events and improving the timeliness of care provided. However, only 46% of healthcare workers were aware of the PCEHR. This study provides a baseline evaluation of perceptions surrounding eHealth and PCHER in acute health services in five metropolitan centres. While there appears to be a readiness for adoption of these strategies for healthcare documentation, patients require motivation to register for the PCEHR, and healthcare workers require more information on the potential benefits to them to achieve more timely and efficient care. © 2016 Royal Australasian College of Physicians.

  3. Using the tracer-dilution discharge method to develop streamflow records for ice-affected streams in Colorado

    Science.gov (United States)

    Capesius, Joseph P.; Sullivan, Joseph R.; O'Neill, Gregory B.; Williams, Cory A.

    2005-01-01

    Accurate ice-affected streamflow records are difficult to obtain for several reasons, which makes the management of instream-flow water rights in the wintertime a challenging endeavor. This report documents a method to improve ice-affected streamflow records for two gaging stations in Colorado. In January and February 2002, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Colorado Water Conservation Board, conducted an experiment using a sodium chloride tracer to measure streamflow under ice cover by the tracer-dilution discharge method. The purpose of this study was to determine the feasibility of obtaining accurate ice-affected streamflow records by using a sodium chloride tracer that was injected into the stream. The tracer was injected at two gaging stations once per day for approximately 20 minutes for 25 days. Multiple-parameter water-quality sensors at the two gaging stations monitored background and peak chloride concentrations. These data were used to determine discharge at each site. A comparison of the current-meter streamflow record to the tracer-dilution streamflow record shows different levels of accuracy and precision of the tracer-dilution streamflow record at the two sites. At the lower elevation and warmer site, Brandon Ditch near Whitewater, the tracer-dilution method overestimated flow by an average of 14 percent, but this average is strongly biased by outliers. At the higher elevation and colder site, Keystone Gulch near Dillon, the tracer-dilution method experienced problems with the tracer solution partially freezing in the injection line. The partial freezing of the tracer contributed to the tracer-dilution method underestimating flow by 52 percent at Keystone Gulch. In addition, a tracer-pump-reliability test was conducted to test how accurately the tracer pumps can discharge the tracer solution in conditions similar to those used at the gaging stations. Although the pumps were reliable and consistent throughout the 25-day study period

  4. Effects of a sexual health care nursing record on the attitudes and practice of oncology nurses.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jung, Dukyoo; Kim, Jung-Hee

    2016-10-01

    A nursing record focused on sexual health care for patients with cancer could encourage oncology nurses to provide sexual health care for oncology patients in a simple and effective manner. However, existing electronic information systems focus on professional use and not sexual health care, which could lead to inefficiencies in clinical practice. To examine the effects of a sexual health care nursing record on the attitudes and practice of oncology nurses. Twenty-four full-time registered nurses caring for oncology patients were randomly assigned to the intervention and control groups in Korea. The researchers developed a sexual health care record and applied it to the intervention group for one month. Data were analyzed by Mann-Whitney U test and chi-square test. Content analysis was used to analyze interviews. Oncology nurses using the sexual health care record had significantly higher levels of sexual health care practice at 4 weeks post-intervention as compared to those who provided usual care to patients with cancer. A sexual health care record may have the potential to facilitate oncology nurses' practice of sexual health care. This study highlighted the importance of using SHC records with oncology patients to improve nursing practice related to sexuality issues. A nursing record focused on SHC for patients with cancer could make it easier and more effective for oncology nurses to provide such care to their patients. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  5. A Study of Factors Affecting the Renewal of Health Insurance Policy

    OpenAIRE

    Bhat Ramesh; Jain Nishant

    2007-01-01

    Health insurance policies are generally one-year policies and to remain part of the insurance poll, policyholders are required to renew their policies each year. Understanding the factors that affect the demand and renewal decisions to continue in health insurance programme is imperative for future growth and development of the insurance sector. We extend our previous work on factors affecting the decision to purchase health insurance to understand the factors affecting the renewal of insuran...

  6. Adaptations of Personal Health Record Platform for Medical Research on Chronic Diseases

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. Krukowski

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available The article reports on experiences in e-Health platforms and services for supporting medical research into the causes and relationships among physiological parameters and health problems concerning different chronic diseases. The Personal Health Record (PHR is a way of standardizing electronic management of medical information between patients and their physicians, including medical bodies collaborating in providing integrated medical care services. We describe roles and aims behind electronic health records, follow with applicable legal and standardizations frameworks and relevant European activities, leading to the presentation of common commercial and open-source implementations of such systems, concluding with the indication of specific adaptations enabling a use of stored personal health data for scientific research into causes and evaluation of chronic illnesses. We describe ethical and privacy concerns that are relevant to using and exchanging electronic health information.

  7. Electronic Health Record Systems and Intent to Apply for Meaningful Use Incentives among Office-based Physician ...

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Order from the National Technical Information Service NCHS Electronic Health Record Systems and Intent to Apply for ... In 2011, 57% of office-based physicians used electronic medical record/electronic health record (EMR/EHR) systems, ...

  8. Pragmatic Randomized, Controlled Trial of Patient Navigators and Enhanced Personal Health Records in CKD.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Navaneethan, Sankar D; Jolly, Stacey E; Schold, Jesse D; Arrigain, Susana; Nakhoul, Georges; Konig, Victoria; Hyland, Jennifer; Burrucker, Yvette K; Dann, Priscilla Davis; Tucky, Barbara H; Sharp, John; Nally, Joseph V

    2017-09-07

    Patient navigators and enhanced personal health records improve the quality of health care delivered in other disease states. We aimed to develop a navigator program for patients with CKD and an electronic health record-based enhanced personal health record to disseminate CKD stage-specific goals of care and education. We also conducted a pragmatic randomized clinical trial to compare the effect of a navigator program for patients with CKD with enhanced personal health record and compare their combination compared with usual care among patients with CKD stage 3b/4. Two hundred and nine patients from six outpatient clinics (in both primary care and nephrology settings) were randomized in a 2×2 factorial design into four-study groups: ( 1 ) enhanced personal health record only, ( 2 ) patient navigator only, ( 3 ) both, and ( 4 ) usual care (control) group. Primary outcome measure was the change in eGFR over a 2-year follow-up period. Secondary outcome measures included acquisition of appropriate CKD-related laboratory measures, specialty referrals, and hospitalization rates. Median age of the study population was 68 years old, and 75% were white. At study entry, 54% of patients were followed by nephrologists, and 88% were on renin-angiotensin system blockers. After a 2-year follow-up, rate of decline in eGFR was similar across the four groups ( P =0.19). Measurements of CKD-related laboratory parameters were not significantly different among the groups. Furthermore, referral for dialysis education and vascular access placement, emergency room visits, and hospitalization rates were not statistically significant different between the groups. We successfully developed a patient navigator program and an enhanced personal health record for the CKD population. However, there were no differences in eGFR decline and other outcomes among the study groups. Larger and long-term studies along with cost-effectiveness analyses are needed to evaluate the role of patient navigators

  9. School Nurse Role in Electronic School Health Records. Position Statement

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hiltz, Cynthia; Johnson, Katie; Lechtenberg, Julia Rae; Maughan, Erin; Trefry, Sharonlee

    2014-01-01

    It is the position of the National Association of School Nurses (NASN) that Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are essential for the registered professional school nurse (hereinafter referred to as school nurse) to provide efficient and effective care in the school and monitor the health of the entire student population. It is also the position of…

  10. Secure management of personal health records by applying attribute-based encryption

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ibraimi, L.; Asim, M.; Petkovic, M.

    2009-01-01

    The confidentiality of personal health records is a major problem when patients use commercial Web-based systems to store their health data. Traditional access control mechanisms have several limitations with respect to enforcing access control policies and ensuring data confidentiality. In

  11. Macro influencers of electronic health records adoption.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Raghavan, Vijay V; Chinta, Ravi; Zhirkin, Nikita

    2015-01-01

    While adoption rates for electronic health records (EHRs) have improved, the reasons for significant geographical differences in EHR adoption within the USA have remained unclear. To understand the reasons for these variations across states, we have compiled from secondary sources a profile of different states within the USA, based on macroeconomic and macro health-environment factors. Regression analyses were performed using these indicator factors on EHR adoption. The results showed that internet usage and literacy are significantly associated with certain measures of EHR adoption. Income level was not significantly associated with EHR adoption. Per capita patient days (a proxy for healthcare need intensity within a state) is negatively correlated with EHR adoption rate. Health insurance coverage is positively correlated with EHR adoption rate. Older physicians (>60 years) tend to adopt EHR systems less than their younger counterparts. These findings have policy implications on formulating regionally focused incentive programs.

  12. Nurses' Perceptions of Nursing Care Documentation in the Electronic Health Record

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jensen, Tracey A.

    2013-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) will soon become the standard for documenting nursing care. The EHR holds the promise of rapid access to complete records of a patient's encounter with the healthcare system. It is the expectation that healthcare providers input essential data that communicates important patient information to support quality…

  13. Health Care Consumer's Perception of the Electronic Medical Record

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Method: A structured questionnaire was developed, validated and utilized in this quantitative research project. Quantitative data were collected ... Electronic Medical Records (EMR), as a health information technology innovation, has ... EMR will provide a highly effective, reliable, secure, and innovative information system.

  14. Ethics and subsequent use of electronic health record data.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lee, Lisa M

    2017-07-01

    The digital health landscape in the United States is evolving and electronic health record data hold great promise for improving health and health equity. Like many scientific and technological advances in health and medicine, there exists an exciting narrative about what we can do with the new technology, as well as reflection about what we should do with it based on what we value. Ethical reflections about the use of EHR data for research and quality improvement have considered the important issues of privacy and informed consent for subsequent use of data. Additional ethical aspects are important in the conversation, including data validity, patient obligation to participate in the learning health system, and ethics integration into training for all personnel who interact with personal health data. Attention to these ethical issues is paramount to our realizing the benefits of electronic health data. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  15. Secure Management of Personal Health Records by Applying Attribute-Based Encryption

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ibraimi, L.; Asim, Muhammad; Petkovic, M.

    2009-01-01

    The confidentiality of personal health records is a major problem when patients use commercial Web-based systems to store their health data. Traditional access control mechanisms, such as Role-Based Access Control, have several limitations with respect to enforcing access control policies and

  16. Quality Assessment of Family Planning Sterilization Services at Health Care Facilities: Case Record Audit.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mathur, Medha; Goyal, Ram Chandra; Mathur, Navgeet

    2017-05-01

    Quality of sterilization services is a matter of concern in India because population control is a necessity. Family Planning Sterilization (FPS) services provided at public health care facilities need to be as per Standard Operating Procedures. To assess the quality of FPS services by audit of case records at selected health care facilities. This cross-sectional study was conducted for two and a half year duration at selected public health care facilities of central India by simple random sampling where FPS services were provided. As per the standards of Government of India, case records were audited and compliance was calculated to assess the quality of services. Results of record audit were satisfactory but important criteria like previous contraceptive history and postoperative counselling were found to be deviated from standards. At Primary Health Centres (PHCs) only 89.5% and at Community Health Centres (CHCs) 58.7% of records were having details of previous contraceptive history. Other criteria like mental illness (only 70% at CHCs) assessment were also inadequate. Although informed consent was found to be having 100% compliance in all records. Quality of care in FPS services is the matter of concern in present scenario for better quality of services. This study may enlighten the policy makers regarding improvements needed for providing quality care.

  17. Benchmarking dairy herd health status using routinely recorded herd summary data.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Parker Gaddis, K L; Cole, J B; Clay, J S; Maltecca, C

    2016-02-01

    Genetic improvement of dairy cattle health through the use of producer-recorded data has been determined to be feasible. Low estimated heritabilities indicate that genetic progress will be slow. Variation observed in lowly heritable traits can largely be attributed to nongenetic factors, such as the environment. More rapid improvement of dairy cattle health may be attainable if herd health programs incorporate environmental and managerial aspects. More than 1,100 herd characteristics are regularly recorded on farm test-days. We combined these data with producer-recorded health event data, and parametric and nonparametric models were used to benchmark herd and cow health status. Health events were grouped into 3 categories for analyses: mastitis, reproductive, and metabolic. Both herd incidence and individual incidence were used as dependent variables. Models implemented included stepwise logistic regression, support vector machines, and random forests. At both the herd and individual levels, random forest models attained the highest accuracy for predicting health status in all health event categories when evaluated with 10-fold cross-validation. Accuracy (SD) ranged from 0.61 (0.04) to 0.63 (0.04) when using random forest models at the herd level. Accuracy of prediction (SD) at the individual cow level ranged from 0.87 (0.06) to 0.93 (0.001) with random forest models. Highly significant variables and key words from logistic regression and random forest models were also investigated. All models identified several of the same key factors for each health event category, including movement out of the herd, size of the herd, and weather-related variables. We concluded that benchmarking health status using routinely collected herd data is feasible. Nonparametric models were better suited to handle this complex data with numerous variables. These data mining techniques were able to perform prediction of health status and could add evidence to personal experience in herd

  18. Health Records and the Cloud Computing Paradigm from a Privacy Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Christian Stingl

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available With the advent of cloud computing, the realization of highly available electronic health records providing location-independent access seems to be very promising. However, cloud computing raises major security issues that need to be addressed particularly within the health care domain. The protection of the privacy of individuals often seems to be left on the sidelines. For instance, common protection against malicious insiders, i.e., non-disclosure agreements, is purely organizational. Clearly, such measures cannot prevent misuses but can at least discourage it. In this paper, we present an approach to storing highly sensitive health data in the cloud whereas the protection of patient's privacy is exclusively based on technical measures, so that users and providers of health records do not need to trust the cloud provider with privacy related issues. Our technical measures comprise anonymous communication and authentication, anonymous yet authorized transactions and pseudonymization of databases.

  19. Knowledge and attitudes of nurses in community health centres about electronic medical records

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Don O’Mahony

    2014-03-01

    Full Text Available Background: Nurses in primary healthcare record data for the monitoring and evaluation of diseases and services. Information and communications technology (ICT can improve quality in healthcare by providing quality medical records. However, worldwide, the majority of health ICT projects have failed. Individual user acceptance is a crucial factor in successful ICT implementation. Objectives: The aim of this study is to explore nurses’ knowledge, attitudes and perceptions regarding ICT so as to inform the future implementation of electronic medical record (EMR systems. Methods: A qualitative design was used. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with nurses at three community health centres (CHCs in the King Sabata Dalyindyebo Local Municipality. The interview guide was informed by the literature on user acceptance of ICT. Interviews were recorded and analysed using content analysis. Results: Many nurses knew about health ICT and articulated clearly the potential benefits of an EMR such as fewer errors, more complete records, easier reporting and access to information. They thought that an EMR system would solve the challenges they identified with the current paper-based record system, including duplication of data, misfiling, lack of a chronological patient record, excessive time in recording and reduced time for patient care. For personal ICT needs, approximately half used cellphone Internet-based services and computers. Conclusions: In this study, nurses identified many challenges with the current recording methods. They thought that an EMR should be installed at CHCs. Their knowledge about EMR, positive attitudes to ICT and personal use of ICT devices increase the likelihood of successful EMR implementation at CHCs.

  20. 2015 Edition Health Information Technology (Health IT) Certification Criteria, 2015 Edition Base Electronic Health Record (EHR) Definition, and ONC Health IT Certification Program Modifications. Final rule.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2015-10-16

    This final rule finalizes a new edition of certification criteria (the 2015 Edition health IT certification criteria or "2015 Edition'') and a new 2015 Edition Base Electronic Health Record (EHR) definition, while also modifying the ONC Health IT Certification Program to make it open and accessible to more types of health IT and health IT that supports various care and practice settings. The 2015 Edition establishes the capabilities and specifies the related standards and implementation specifications that Certified Electronic Health Record Technology (CEHRT) would need to include to, at a minimum, support the achievement of meaningful use by eligible professionals (EPs), eligible hospitals, and critical access hospitals (CAHs) under the Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs (EHR Incentive Programs) when such edition is required for use under these programs.

  1. Identification of Patient Safety Risks Associated with Electronic Health Records: A Software Quality Perspective.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Virginio, Luiz A; Ricarte, Ivan Luiz Marques

    2015-01-01

    Although Electronic Health Records (EHR) can offer benefits to the health care process, there is a growing body of evidence that these systems can also incur risks to patient safety when developed or used improperly. This work is a literature review to identify these risks from a software quality perspective. Therefore, the risks were classified based on the ISO/IEC 25010 software quality model. The risks identified were related mainly to the characteristics of "functional suitability" (i.e., software bugs) and "usability" (i.e., interface prone to user error). This work elucidates the fact that EHR quality problems can adversely affect patient safety, resulting in errors such as incorrect patient identification, incorrect calculation of medication dosages, and lack of access to patient data. Therefore, the risks presented here provide the basis for developers and EHR regulating bodies to pay attention to the quality aspects of these systems that can result in patient harm.

  2. Improving Service Coordination and Reducing Mental Health Disparities Through Adoption of Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    McGregor, Brian; Mack, Dominic; Wrenn, Glenda; Shim, Ruth S; Holden, Kisha; Satcher, David

    2015-09-01

    Despite widespread support for removing barriers to the use of electronic health records (EHRs) in behavioral health care, adoption of EHRs in behavioral health settings lags behind adoption in other areas of health care. The authors discuss barriers to use of EHRs among behavioral health care practitioners, suggest solutions to overcome these barriers, and describe the potential benefits of EHRs to reduce behavioral health care disparities. Thoughtful and comprehensive strategies will be needed to design EHR systems that address concerns about policy, practice, costs, and stigma and that protect patients' privacy and confidentiality. However, these goals must not detract from continuing to challenge the notion that behavioral health and general medical health should be treated as separate and distinct. Ultimately, utilization of EHRs among behavioral health care providers will improve the coordination of services and overall patient care, which is essential to reducing mental health disparities.

  3. Electronic Health Records Prospects in Egypt: A Demand-Side Perspective

    OpenAIRE

    Badran; Mona Farid

    2017-01-01

    The present study sheds light on the expected factors that would impact the Electronic Health Records (EHR) service in Egypt from the demand-side perspective, i.e. the health care consumer. This empirical study is motivated by the widespread use of EHR as a method of promoting health services globally, where it is considered as an efficiency enhancing, cost effective technology. Moreover, the healthcare sector in Egypt is gaining momentum, especially that the comprehensive healthcare and soci...

  4. Deploying Electronic Health Record (HER) and Information ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    From researches and investigation on the utilization of health care based technologies, there were discoveries that certain kind of population, in the minority, was affected. Recent and evolving use of Information Technology in the healthcare sector among the population that is in the minority and ethnicity in critically ...

  5. Understanding factors affecting patient and public engagement and recruitment to digital health interventions: a systematic review of qualitative studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    O'Connor, Siobhan; Hanlon, Peter; O'Donnell, Catherine A; Garcia, Sonia; Glanville, Julie; Mair, Frances S

    2016-09-15

    Numerous types of digital health interventions (DHIs) are available to patients and the public but many factors affect their ability to engage and enrol in them. This systematic review aims to identify and synthesise the qualitative literature on barriers and facilitators to engagement and recruitment to DHIs to inform future implementation efforts. PubMed, MEDLINE, CINAHL, Embase, Scopus and the ACM Digital Library were searched for English language qualitative studies from 2000 - 2015 that discussed factors affecting engagement and enrolment in a range of DHIs (e.g. 'telemedicine', 'mobile applications', 'personal health record', 'social networking'). Text mining and additional search strategies were used to identify 1,448 records. Two reviewers independently carried out paper screening, quality assessment, data extraction and analysis. Data was analysed using framework synthesis, informed by Normalization Process Theory, and Burden of Treatment Theory helped conceptualise the interpretation of results. Nineteen publications were included in the review. Four overarching themes that affect patient and public engagement and enrolment in DHIs emerged; 1) personal agency and motivation; 2) personal life and values; 3) the engagement and recruitment approach; and 4) the quality of the DHI. The review also summarises engagement and recruitment strategies used. A preliminary DIgital Health EnGagement MOdel (DIEGO) was developed to highlight the key processes involved. Existing knowledge gaps are identified and a number of recommendations made for future research. Study limitations include English language publications and exclusion of grey literature. This review summarises and highlights the complexity of digital health engagement and recruitment processes and outlines issues that need to be addressed before patients and the public commit to digital health and it can be implemented effectively. More work is needed to create successful engagement strategies and better

  6. Towards the Application of Open Source Software in Developing National Electronic Health Record-Narrative Review Article.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aminpour, Farzaneh; Sadoughi, Farahnaz; Ahmadi, Maryam

    2013-12-01

    Electronic Health Record (EHR) is a repository of patient health information shared among multiple authorized users. As a modern method of storing and processing health information, it is a solution for improving quality, safety and efficiency of patient care and health system. However, establishment of EHR requires a significant investment of time and money. While many of healthcare providers have very limited capital, application of open source software would be considered as a solution in developing national electronic health record especially in countries with low income. The evidence showed that financial limitation is one of the obstacles to implement electronic health records in developing countries. Therefore, establishment of an open source EHR system capable of modifications according to the national requirements seems to be inevitable in Iran. The present study identifies the impact of application of open source software in developing national electronic health record in Iran.

  7. Integration of the enterprise electronic health record and anesthesia information management systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Springman, Scott R

    2011-09-01

    Fewer than 5% of anesthesia departments use an electronic medical record (EMR) that is anesthesia specific. Many anesthesia information management systems (AIMS) have been developed with a focus only on the unique needs of anesthesia providers, without being fully integrated into other electronic health record components of the entire enterprise medical system. To understand why anesthesia providers should embrace health information technology (HIT) on a health system-wide basis, this article reviews recent HIT history and reviews HIT concepts. The author explores current developments in efforts to expand enterprise HIT, and the pros and cons of full enterprise integration with an AIMS. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  8. Stress response and health affecting compounds in Brassicaceae

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Jahangir, Muhammad

    2010-01-01

    Summary of the Thesis: Vegetables have always been considered as healthy food. So also Brassica vegetables are well known all over the world as a common food due to the presence of health affecting compounds (Chapter 2). A vast amount of data is available for health promoting compounds in

  9. Documentation of delirium in the VA electronic health record

    Science.gov (United States)

    2014-01-01

    Background Delirium is a life-threatening, clinical syndrome common among the elderly and hospitalized patients. Delirium is under-recognized and misdiagnosed, complicating efforts to study the epidemiology and construct appropriate decision support to improve patient care. This study was primarily conducted to realize how providers documented confirmed cases of delirium in electronic health records as a preliminary step for using computerized methods to identify patients with delirium from electronic health records. Methods The Mental Health Consult (MHC) team reported cases of delirium to the study team during a 6-month study period (December 1, 2009 - May 31, 2010). A chart extraction tool was developed to abstract documentation of diagnosis, signs and symptoms and known risk factors of delirium. A nurse practitioner, and a clinical pharmacist independently reviewed clinical notes during each patients hospital stay to determine if delirium and or sign and symptoms of delirium were documented. Results The MHC team reported 25 cases of delirium. When excluding MHC team notes, delirium was documented for 5 of the 25 patients (one reported case in a physician’s note, four in discharge summaries). Delirium was ICD-9 Coded for 7 of the 25 cases. Signs and symptoms associated with delirium were characterized in 8 physician notes, 11 discharge summaries, and 14 nursing notes, accounting for 16 of the 25 cases with identified delirium. Conclusions Documentation of delirium is highly inconsistent even with a confirmed diagnosis. Hence, efforts to use existing data to precisely estimate the prevalence of delirium or to conduct epidemiological studies based on medical records will be challenging. PMID:24708799

  10. Tracking official development assistance for reproductive health in conflict-affected countries: 2002-2011.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Patel, P; Dahab, M; Tanabe, M; Murphy, A; Ettema, L; Guy, S; Roberts, B

    2016-09-01

    To provide information on trends on official development assistance (ODA) disbursement patterns for reproductive health activities in 18 conflict-affected countries. Secondary data analysis. 18 conflict-affected countries and 36 non-conflict-affected countries. The Creditor Reporting System (CRS) database was analyzed for ODA disbursement for direct and indirect reproductive health activities to 18 conflict-affected countries (2002-2011). A comparative analysis was also made with 36 non-conflict-affected counties in the same 'least-developed' income category. Multivariate regression analyses examined associations between conflict status and reproductive health ODA and between reproductive needs and ODA disbursements. Patterns of ODA disbursements (constant U.S. dollars) for reproductive health activities. The average annual ODA disbursed for reproductive health to 18 conflict-affected countries from 2002 to 2011 was US$ 1.93 per person per year. There was an increase of 298% in ODA for reproductive health activities to the conflict-affected countries between 2002 and 2011; 56% of this increase was due to increases in HIV/AIDS funding. The average annual per capita reproductive health ODA disbursed to least-developed non-conflict-affected countries was 57% higher than to least-developed conflict-affected countries. Regression analyses confirmed disparities in ODA to and between conflict-affected countries. Despite increases in ODA for reproductive health for conflict-affected countries (albeit largely for HIV/AIDS activities), considerable disparities remains. Study tracking 10 years of aid for reproductive aid shows major disparities for conflict-affected countries. © 2016 The Authors. BJOG An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

  11. Protecting patients’ electronic health records using enhanced active bundles

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Salih, R.M.; Lilien, L.T.; Ben Othmane, L.; Arriaga, R.; Matic, A.

    2012-01-01

    We propose a solution that provides protection for patients' electronic health/medical records disseminated among different authorized healthcare information systems. The solution is known as Active Bundles using a Trusted Third Party (ABTTP). It is based on the use of trusted third parties, and the

  12. Examining the Relationship between Electronic Health Record Interoperability and Quality Management

    Science.gov (United States)

    Purcell, Bernice M.

    2013-01-01

    A lack of interoperability impairs data quality among health care providers' electronic health record (EHR) systems. The problem is whether the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 9000 principles relate to the problem of interoperability in implementation of EHR systems. The purpose of the nonexperimental quantitative research…

  13. Evolution of Medication Administration Workflow in Implementing Electronic Health Record System

    Science.gov (United States)

    Huang, Yuan-Han

    2013-01-01

    This study focused on the clinical workflow evolutions when implementing the health information technology (HIT). The study especially emphasized on administrating medication when the electronic health record (EHR) systems were adopted at rural healthcare facilities. Mixed-mode research methods, such as survey, observation, and focus group, were…

  14. [Shared electronic health record in Catalonia, Spain].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marimon-Suñol, Santiago; Rovira-Barberà, María; Acedo-Anta, Mateo; Nozal-Baldajos, Montserrat A; Guanyabens-Calvet, Joan

    2010-02-01

    Under the law adopted by its Parliament, the Government of Catalonia has developed an electronic medical record system for its National Health System (NHS). The model is governed by the following principles: 1) The citizen as owner of the data: direct access to his data and right to exercise his opposition's privileges; 2) Generate confidence in the system: security and confidentiality strength; 3) Shared model of information management: publishing system and access to organized and structured information, keeping in mind that the NHS of Catalonia is formally an "Integrated system of healthcare public use" (catalan acronym: SISCAT) with a wide variety of legal structures within its healthcare institutions; 4) Use of communication standards and catalogs as a need for technological and functional integration. In summary: single system of medical records shared between different actors, using interoperability tools and whose development is according to the legislation applicable in Catalonia and within its healthcare system. The result has been the establishment of a set of components and relation rules among which we highlight the following: 1) Display of information that collects sociodemographic data of the citizen, documents or reports (radiology, laboratory, therapeutic procedures, hospital release, emergency room), diagnostic health, prescription and immunization plus a summary screen with the most recent and relevant references; 2) Set of tools helping the user and direct messaging between professionals to facilitate their cooperation; 3) Model designed for supranational connections which will allow adding later, with ad hoc rules, clinical data provided by the private health sector or the proper citizen. 2010 Elsevier España S.L. All rights reserved.

  15. Predicting Comorbid Conditions and Trajectories using Social Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ji, Xiang; Ae Chun, Soon; Geller, James

    2016-05-05

    Many patients suffer from comorbidity conditions, for example, obese patients often develop type-2 diabetes and hypertension. In the US, 80% of Medicare spending is for managing patients with these multiple coexisting conditions. Predicting potential comorbidity conditions for an individual patient can promote preventive care and reduce costs. Predicting possible comorbidity progression paths can provide important insights into population heath and aid with decisions in public health policies. Discovering the comorbidity relationships is complex and difficult, due to limited access to Electronic Health Records by privacy laws. In this paper, we present a collaborative comorbidity prediction method to predict likely comorbid conditions for individual patients, and a trajectory prediction graph model to reveal progression paths of comorbid conditions. Our prediction approaches utilize patient generated health reports on online social media, called Social Health Records (SHR). The experimental results based on one SHR source show that our method is able to predict future comorbid conditions for a patient with coverage values of 48% and 75% for a top-20 and a top-100 ranked list, respectively. For risk trajectory prediction, our approach is able to reveal each potential progression trajectory between any two conditions and infer the confidence of the future trajectory, given any observed condition. The predicted trajectories are validated with existing comorbidity relations from the medical literature.

  16. Indirect environmental effects of nuclear war affecting health

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Leaf, A.

    1984-01-01

    The indirect effects of a nuclear war that will affect the health of survivors are considered to include consequences to: (a) the economies of nations, (b) food and nutrition, (c) water supplies, (d) the climate and the ecosphere, and (e) sanitation and public health; and they include long-term radiation effects

  17. Computerized health physics record system at a Canadian fabrication facility

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thind, K.S.

    1984-01-01

    This poster session will describe the types of Health Physics data input into a Hewlett-Packard 3000 computer. The Health Physics data base at this facility includes the following: employee hours data, airborne uranium concentrations, external dosemetry (badge readings), internal dosemetry (bioassay) and environmental health physics (stack sample results) data. It will describe the types of outputs achievable in the form of various reports, such as: individual employee health physics report for a given period, a general health physics summary report for a given period, individual urinalysis report, local air concentration report and graphs. The use of this computerized health physics record system in the overall radiation protection program at this facility is discussed

  18. Designing for Underserved Populations: Constraints and Requirements of Personal Health Record Systems

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    In this podcast, Dr. Thomas Horan discusses how language, literacy, and access barriers can be overcome with electronic Personal Health Record (PHR) systems to improve health among the most vulnerable, isolated, and underserved populations.

  19. Knowledge and attitudes of nurses in community health centres about electronic medical records

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Don O'Mahony

    2014-02-01

    Full Text Available Background: Nurses in primary healthcare record data for the monitoring and evaluation of diseases and services. Information and communications technology (ICT can improve quality in healthcare by providing quality medical records. However, worldwide, the majority of health ICT projects have failed. Individual user acceptance is a crucial factor in successful ICT implementation. Objectives: The aim of this study is to explore nurses’ knowledge, attitudes and perceptions regarding ICT so as to inform the future implementation of electronic medical record (EMR systems. Methods: A qualitative design was used. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with nurses at three community health centres (CHCs in the King Sabata Dalyindyebo Local Municipality. The interview guide was informed by the literature on user acceptance of ICT. Interviews were recorded and analysed using content analysis. Results: Many nurses knew about health ICT and articulated clearly the potential benefits of an EMR such as fewer errors, more complete records, easier reporting and access to information. They thought that an EMR system would solve the challenges they identified with the current paper-based record system, including duplication of data, misfiling, lack of a chronological patient record, excessive time in recording and reduced time for patient care. For personal ICT needs, approximately half used cellphone Internet-based services and computers. Conclusions: In this study, nurses identified many challenges with the current recording methods. They thought that an EMR should be installed at CHCs. Their knowledge about EMR, positive attitudes to ICT and personal use of ICT devices increase the likelihood of successful EMR implementation at CHCs.

  20. Localizing the HL7 Personal Health Monitoring Record for Danish Telemedicine

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Christensen, Henrik Bærbak

    2014-01-01

    Telemedicine holds a promise of lowering cost in health care and improving the life quality of chronic ill patients by allowing monitoring in the home. The Personal Health Monitoring Record (PHMR) is an international HL7 standard data format for encoding measurements made by devices in the home...

  1. Does temperament affect learning in calves?

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Webb, Laura E.; van Reenen, Cornelis G.; Jensen, Margit Bak

    2015-01-01

    challenge tests, may affect learning an operant conditioning task in calves. Understanding how temperament affects learning in calves can help with the training of calves on novel automated feeding apparatuses or on novel feed components, and can thus help improve calf health and welfare.......The aim of the study was to investigate how temperament affects learning ability in calves. Nine two-month-old Holstein-Friesian bull calves were subjected to four challenge tests: novel object (NOT), novel environment (NET), social isolation (SIT), and social isolation with a novel environmental...... cue (SI/E). During these tests, hypothesised temperament variables were recorded. Hypothesised learning variables were recorded during training on an operant task. Principal component analysis (PCA) was conducted on temperament variables and learning variables separately. Principal components (PCs...

  2. Electronic Health Record for Temporomandibular Joint Disorders – Support in Therapeutic Process

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hippmann, R.; Nagy, Miroslav; Dostálová, T.; Zvárová, Jana; Seydlová, M.; Feltlová, E.

    2010-01-01

    Roč. 6, č. 1 (2010), s. 27-32 ISSN 1801-5603 R&D Projects: GA MŠk(CZ) 1M06014 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * automatic speech recognition * dental cross * temporomandibular joint * temporomandibular joint disorders * structured data entry * dentistry * data model * text-to-speech system * Research Diagnostic Criteria for TMD Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science http://www.ejbi.org/en/ejbi/article/25-en- electronic - health - record -for-temporomandibular-joint-disorders-support-in-therapeutic-process.html

  3. [Personal health records: the case of the Personal Health Folder of Catalonia (Spain)].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Saigí, Francesc; Cerdá Calafat, Ismael; Guanyabens Calvet, Joan; Carrau Vidal, Elisenda

    2012-01-01

    The aims of this study were to explore the possibilities of the Personal Health Folder and to identify the gap between the potential applications of this tool and what it offers through the Internet. The Personal Health Folder is presented, a project linked to the Shared Medical Record of Catalonia (Spain), which provides citizens with an access point to information about their health insurance, customized and supported by information and communication technologies. The project was carried out by the Ministry of Health of the Government of Catalonia (Generalitat de Catalunya) and data were gathered through an anonymous survey. The results were critical to obtain information on the suitability of the published data and on the expectations of a tool aimed at the general population. Copyright © 2012 SESPAS. Published by Elsevier Espana. All rights reserved.

  4. Perceived health in lung cancer patients: the role of positive and negative affect.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hirsch, Jameson K; Floyd, Andrea R; Duberstein, Paul R

    2012-03-01

    To examine the association of affective experience and health-related quality of life in lung cancer patients, we hypothesized that negative affect would be positively, and positive affect would be negatively, associated with perceived health. A sample of 133 English-speaking lung cancer patients (33% female; mean age = 63.68 years old, SD = 9.37) completed a battery of self-report surveys. Results of our secondary analysis indicate that trait negative affect was significantly associated with poor physical and social functioning, greater role limitations due to emotional problems, greater bodily pain, and poor general health. Positive affect was significantly associated with adaptive social functioning, fewer emotion-based role limitations, and less severe bodily pain. In a full model, positive affect was significantly associated with greater levels of social functioning and general health, over and above the effects of negative affect. Reduction of negative affect is an important therapeutic goal, but the ability to maintain positive affect may result in greater perceived health. Indeed, engagement in behaviors that result in greater state positive affect may, over time, result in dispositional changes and enhancement of quality of life.

  5. Privacy, security, and the public health researcher in the era of electronic health record research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Goldstein, Neal D; Sarwate, Anand D

    2016-01-01

    Health data derived from electronic health records are increasingly utilized in large-scale population health analyses. Going hand in hand with this increase in data is an increasing number of data breaches. Ensuring privacy and security of these data is a shared responsibility between the public health researcher, collaborators, and their institutions. In this article, we review the requirements of data privacy and security and discuss epidemiologic implications of emerging technologies from the computer science community that can be used for health data. In order to ensure that our needs as researchers are captured in these technologies, we must engage in the dialogue surrounding the development of these tools.

  6. Mediation, moderation, and context: Understanding complex relations among cognition, affect, and health behaviour.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kiviniemi, Marc T; Ellis, Erin M; Hall, Marissa G; Moss, Jennifer L; Lillie, Sarah E; Brewer, Noel T; Klein, William M P

    2018-01-01

    Researchers have historically treated cognition and affect as separate constructs in motivating health behaviour. We present a framework and empirical evidence for complex relations between cognition and affect in predicting health behaviour. Main Outcome, Design and Results: First, affect and cognition can mediate each other's relation to health behaviour. Second, affect and cognition can moderate the other's impact. Third, context can change the interplay of affect and cognition. Fourth, affect and cognition may be indelibly fused in some psychological constructs (e.g. worry, anticipated regret and reactance). These four propositions in our framework are not mutually exclusive. Examination of the types of complex relations described here can benefit theory development, empirical testing of theories and intervention design. Doing so will advance the understanding of mechanisms involved in regulation of health behaviours and the effectiveness of interventions to change health behaviours.

  7. National electronic health records and the digital disruption of moral orders.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Garrety, Karin; McLoughlin, Ian; Wilson, Rob; Zelle, Gregor; Martin, Mike

    2014-01-01

    The digitalisation of patient health data to provide national electronic health record systems (NEHRS) is a major objective of many governments. Proponents claim that NEHRS will streamline care, reduce mistakes and cut costs. However, building these systems has proved highly problematic. Using recent developments in Australia as an example, we argue that a hitherto unexamined source of difficulty concerns the way NEHRS disrupt the moral orders governing the production, ownership, use of and responsibility for health records. Policies that pursue digitalisation as a self-evident 'solution' to problems in healthcare without due regard to these disruptions risk alienating key stakeholders. We propose a more emergent approach to the development and implementation of NEHRS that supports moral re-ordering around rights and responsibilities appropriate to the intentions of those involved in healthcare relationships. Crown Copyright © 2013. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  8. The effect of electronic health record software design on resident documentation and compliance with evidence-based medicine.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rodriguez Torres, Yasaira; Huang, Jordan; Mihlstin, Melanie; Juzych, Mark S; Kromrei, Heidi; Hwang, Frank S

    2017-01-01

    This study aimed to determine the role of electronic health record software in resident education by evaluating documentation of 30 elements extracted from the American Academy of Ophthalmology Dry Eye Syndrome Preferred Practice Pattern. The Kresge Eye Institute transitioned to using electronic health record software in June 2013. We evaluated the charts of 331 patients examined in the resident ophthalmology clinic between September 1, 2011, and March 31, 2014, for an initial evaluation for dry eye syndrome. We compared documentation rates for the 30 evidence-based elements between electronic health record chart note templates among the ophthalmology residents. Overall, significant changes in documentation occurred when transitioning to a new version of the electronic health record software with average compliance ranging from 67.4% to 73.6% (p Electronic Health Record A had high compliance (>90%) in 13 elements while Electronic Health Record B had high compliance (>90%) in 11 elements. The presence of dialog boxes was responsible for significant changes in documentation of adnexa, puncta, proptosis, skin examination, contact lens wear, and smoking exposure. Significant differences in documentation were correlated with electronic health record template design rather than individual resident or residents' year in training. Our results show that electronic health record template design influences documentation across all resident years. Decreased documentation likely results from "mouse click fatigue" as residents had to access multiple dialog boxes to complete documentation. These findings highlight the importance of EHR template design to improve resident documentation and integration of evidence-based medicine into their clinical notes.

  9. An electronic health record for infertility clinics | Coetsee | South ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Objective. To design a user-friendly electronic health record system for infertility clinics (EHRIC) to capture quality data that will allow advanced audit and practice analysis, and to use the captured data for the South African Register of Assisted Reproductive Techniques (SARA) database and as a clinical research function.

  10. Electronic Health Record-Related Safety Concerns: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Electronic Health Record Users

    Science.gov (United States)

    Pajunen, Tuuli; Saranto, Kaija; Lehtonen, Lasse

    2016-01-01

    Background The rapid expansion in the use of electronic health records (EHR) has increased the number of medical errors originating in health information systems (HIS). The sociotechnical approach helps in understanding risks in the development, implementation, and use of EHR and health information technology (HIT) while accounting for complex interactions of technology within the health care system. Objective This study addresses two important questions: (1) “which of the common EHR error types are associated with perceived high- and extreme-risk severity ratings among EHR users?”, and (2) “which variables are associated with high- and extreme-risk severity ratings?” Methods This study was a quantitative, non-experimental, descriptive study of EHR users. We conducted a cross-sectional web-based questionnaire study at the largest hospital district in Finland. Statistical tests included the reliability of the summative scales tested with Cronbach’s alpha. Logistic regression served to assess the association of the independent variables to each of the eight risk factors examined. Results A total of 2864 eligible respondents provided the final data. Almost half of the respondents reported a high level of risk related to the error type “extended EHR unavailability”. The lowest overall risk level was associated with “selecting incorrectly from a list of items”. In multivariate analyses, profession and clinical unit proved to be the strongest predictors for high perceived risk. Physicians perceived risk levels to be the highest (Prisk levels (PeLearning courses on EHR-use was associated with lower risk for some of the risk factors. Conclusions Based on a large number of Finnish EHR users in hospitals, this study indicates that HIT safety hazards should be taken very seriously, particularly in operating rooms, procedure units, emergency departments, and intensive care units/critical care units. Health care organizations should use proactive and

  11. The Successful Implementation of Electronic Health Records at Small Rural Hospitals

    Science.gov (United States)

    Richardson, Daniel

    2016-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) have been in use since the 1960s. U.S. rural hospital leaders and administrators face significant pressure to implement health information technology because of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. However, some leaders and managers of small rural hospital lack strategies to develop and implement…

  12. Obesity research based on the Copenhagen School Health Records Register

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Baker, Jennifer L; Sørensen, Thorkild I A

    2011-01-01

    INTRODUCTION: To summarise key findings from research performed using data from the Copenhagen School Health Records Register over the last 30 years with a main focus on obesity-related research. The register contains computerised anthropometric information on 372,636 schoolchildren from the capi......INTRODUCTION: To summarise key findings from research performed using data from the Copenhagen School Health Records Register over the last 30 years with a main focus on obesity-related research. The register contains computerised anthropometric information on 372,636 schoolchildren from...... the capital city of Denmark. Additional information on the cohort members has been obtained via linkages with population studies and national registers. RESEARCH TOPICS: Studies using data from the register have made important contributions in the areas of the aetiology of obesity, the development...... of the obesity epidemic, and the long-term health consequences of birth weight as well as body size and growth in childhood. CONCLUSION: Research using this unique register is ongoing, and its contributions to the study of obesity as well as other topics will continue for years to come....

  13. When is affect variability bad for health? The association between affect variability and immune response to the influenza vaccination.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jenkins, Brooke N; Hunter, John F; Cross, Marie P; Acevedo, Amanda M; Pressman, Sarah D

    2018-01-01

    This study addresses methodological and theoretical questions about the association between affect and physical health. Specifically, we examine the role of affect variability and its interaction with mean levels of affect to predict antibody (Ab) levels in response to an influenza vaccination. Participants (N=83) received the vaccination and completed daily diary measures of affect four times a day for 13days. At one and four months post-vaccination, blood was collected from the participants to assess Ab levels. Findings indicate that affect variability and its interaction with mean levels of affect predict an individual's immune response. Those high in mean positive affect (PA) who had more PA variability were more likely to have a lower Ab response in comparison to those who had high mean PA and less PA variability. Although it did not interact with mean negative affect (NA), NA variability on its own was associated with Ab response, whereby those with less NA variability mounted a more robust immune response. Affect variability is related to immune response to an influenza vaccination and, in some cases, interacts with mean levels of affect. These oscillations in affective experiences are critical to consider in order to unpack the intricacies of how affect influences health. These findings suggest that future researchers should consider the important role of affect variability on physical health-relevant outcomes as well as examine the moderating effect of mean affect levels. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  14. Exploring Type-and-Identity-Based Proxy Re-Encryption Scheme to Securely Manage Personal Health Records

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ibraimi, L.; Gangopadhyay, Aryya; Tang, Qiang; Hartel, Pieter H.; Jonker, Willem

    2010-01-01

    Commercial Web-based Personal-Health Record (PHR) systems can help patients to share their personal health records (PHRs) anytime from anywhere. PHRs are very sensitive data and an inappropriate disclosure may cause serious problems to an individual. Therefore commercial Web-based PHR systems have

  15. Adoption of Electronic Personal Health Records in Canada: Perceptions of Stakeholders.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gagnon, Marie-Pierre; Payne-Gagnon, Julie; Breton, Erik; Fortin, Jean-Paul; Khoury, Lara; Dolovich, Lisa; Price, David; Wiljer, David; Bartlett, Gillian; Archer, Norman

    2016-04-06

    Healthcare stakeholders have a great interest in the adoption and use of electronic personal health records (ePHRs) because of the potential benefits associated with them. Little is known, however, about the level of adoption of ePHRs in Canada and there is limited evidence concerning their benefits and implications for the healthcare system. This study aimed to describe the current situation of ePHRs in Canada and explore stakeholder perceptions regarding barriers and facilitators to their adoption. Using a qualitative descriptive study design, we conducted semi-structured phone interviews between October 2013 and February 2014 with 35 individuals from seven Canadian provinces. The participants represented six stakeholder groups (patients, ePHR administrators, healthcare professionals, organizations interested in health technology development, government agencies, and researchers). A detailed summary of each interview was created and thematic analysis was conducted. We observed that there was no consensual definition of ePHR in Canada. Factors that could influence ePHR adoption were related to knowledge (confusion with other electronic medical records [EMRs] and lack of awareness), system design (usability and relevance), user capacities and attitudes (patient health literacy, education and interest, support for professionals), environmental factors (government commitment, targeted populations) and legal and ethical issues (information control and custody, confidentiality, privacy and security). ePHRs are slowly entering the Canadian healthcare landscape but provinces do not seem well-prepared for the implementation of this type of record. Guidance is needed on critical issues regarding ePHRs, such as ePHR definition, data ownership, access to information and interoperability with other electronic health records (EHRs). Better guidance on these issues would provide a greater awareness of ePHRs and inform stakeholders including clinicians, decision-makers, patients

  16. Adoption of Electronic Personal Health Records in Canada: Perceptions of Stakeholders

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marie-Pierre Gagnon

    2016-07-01

    Full Text Available Background: Healthcare stakeholders have a great interest in the adoption and use of electronic personal health records (ePHRs because of the potential benefits associated with them. Little is known, however, about the level of adoption of ePHRs in Canada and there is limited evidence concerning their benefits and implications for the healthcare system. This study aimed to describe the current situation of ePHRs in Canada and explore stakeholder perceptions regarding barriers and facilitators to their adoption. Methods: Using a qualitative descriptive study design, we conducted semi-structured phone interviews between October 2013 and February 2014 with 35 individuals from seven Canadian provinces. The participants represented six stakeholder groups (patients, ePHR administrators, healthcare professionals, organizations interested in health technology development, government agencies, and researchers. A detailed summary of each interview was created and thematic analysis was conducted. Results: We observed that there was no consensual definition of ePHR in Canada. Factors that could influence ePHR adoption were related to knowledge (confusion with other electronic medical records [EMRs] and lack of awareness, system design (usability and relevance, user capacities and attitudes (patient health literacy, education and interest, support for professionals, environmental factors (government commitment, targeted populations and legal and ethical issues (information control and custody, confidentiality, privacy and security. Conclusion: ePHRs are slowly entering the Canadian healthcare landscape but provinces do not seem wellprepared for the implementation of this type of record. Guidance is needed on critical issues regarding ePHRs, such as ePHR definition, data ownership, access to information and interoperability with other electronic health records (EHRs. Better guidance on these issues would provide a greater awareness of ePHRs and inform

  17. Electronic Health Records: An Enhanced Security Paradigm to Preserve Patient's Privacy

    Science.gov (United States)

    Slamanig, Daniel; Stingl, Christian

    In recent years, demographic change and increasing treatment costs demand the adoption of more cost efficient, highly qualitative and integrated health care processes. The rapid growth and availability of the Internet facilitate the development of eHealth services and especially of electronic health records (EHRs) which are promising solutions to meet the aforementioned requirements. Considering actual web-based EHR systems, patient-centric and patient moderated approaches are widely deployed. Besides, there is an emerging market of so called personal health record platforms, e.g. Google Health. Both concepts provide a central and web-based access to highly sensitive medical data. Additionally, the fact that these systems may be hosted by not fully trustworthy providers necessitates to thoroughly consider privacy issues. In this paper we define security and privacy objectives that play an important role in context of web-based EHRs. Furthermore, we discuss deployed solutions as well as concepts proposed in the literature with respect to this objectives and point out several weaknesses. Finally, we introduce a system which overcomes the drawbacks of existing solutions by considering an holistic approach to preserve patient's privacy and discuss the applied methods.

  18. Electronic health records: a valuable tool for dental school strategic planning.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Filker, Phyllis J; Cook, Nicole; Kodish-Stav, Jodi

    2013-05-01

    The objective of this study was to investigate if electronic patient records have utility in dental school strategic planning. Electronic health records (EHRs) have been used by all predoctoral students and faculty members at Nova Southeastern University's College of Dental Medicine (NSU-CDM) since 2006. The study analyzed patient demographic and caries risk assessment data from October 2006 to May 2011 extracted from the axiUm EHR database. The purpose was to determine if there was a relationship between high oral health care needs and patient demographics, including gender, age, and median income of the zip code where they reside in order to support dental school strategic planning including the locations of future satellite clinics. The results showed that about 51 percent of patients serviced by the Broward County-based NSU-CDM oral health care facilities have high oral health care needs and that about 60 percent of this population resides in zip codes where the average income is below the median income for the county ($41,691). The results suggest that EHR data can be used adjunctively by dental schools when proposing potential sites for satellite clinics and planning for future oral health care programming.

  19. Access Control Model for Sharing Composite Electronic Health Records

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jin, Jing; Ahn, Gail-Joon; Covington, Michael J.; Zhang, Xinwen

    The adoption of electronically formatted medical records, so called Electronic Health Records (EHRs), has become extremely important in healthcare systems to enable the exchange of medical information among stakeholders. An EHR generally consists of data with different types and sensitivity degrees which must be selectively shared based on the need-to-know principle. Security mechanisms are required to guarantee that only authorized users have access to specific portions of such critical record for legitimate purposes. In this paper, we propose a novel approach for modelling access control scheme for composite EHRs. Our model formulates the semantics and structural composition of an EHR document, from which we introduce a notion of authorized zones of the composite EHR at different granularity levels, taking into consideration of several important criteria such as data types, intended purposes and information sensitivities.

  20. Exploring Workarounds Related to Electronic Health Record System Usage: A Study Protocol

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Blijleven, Vincent; Koelemeijer, Kitty; Jaspers, Monique

    2017-01-01

    Health care providers resort to informal temporary practices known as workarounds for handling exceptions to normal workflow that are unintentionally imposed by electronic health record (EHR) systems. Although workarounds may seem favorable at first sight, they are generally suboptimal and may

  1. Family-based prevention of mental health problems in children affected by HIV and AIDS: an open trial.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Betancourt, Theresa S; Ng, Lauren C; Kirk, Catherine M; Munyanah, Morris; Mushashi, Christina; Ingabire, Charles; Teta, Sharon; Beardslee, William R; Brennan, Robert T; Zahn, Ista; Stulac, Sara; Cyamatare, Felix R; Sezibera, Vincent

    2014-07-01

    The objective of this study is to assess the feasibility and acceptability of an intervention to reduce mental health problems and bolster resilience among children living in households affected by caregiver HIV in Rwanda. Pre-post design, including 6-month follow-up. The Family Strengthening Intervention (FSI) aims to reduce mental health problems among HIV-affected children through improved child-caregiver relationships, family communication and parenting skills, HIV psychoeducation and connections to resources. Twenty families (N = 39 children) with at least one HIV-positive caregiver and one child 7-17 years old were enrolled in the FSI. Children and caregivers were administered locally adapted and validated measures of child mental health problems, as well as measures of protective processes and parenting. Assessments were administered at pre and postintervention, and 6-month follow-up. Multilevel models accounting for clustering by family tested changes in outcomes of interest. Qualitative interviews were completed to understand acceptability, feasibility and satisfaction with the FSI. Families reported high satisfaction with the FSI. Caregiver-reported improvements in family connectedness, good parenting, social support and children's pro-social behaviour (P self-esteem, depression, anxiety and irritability were seen at follow-up (P < .05). Significant decreases in child-reported harsh punishment were observed at postintervention and follow-up, and decreases in caregiver reported harsh punishment were also recorded on follow-up (P < 0.05). The FSI is a feasible and acceptable intervention that shows promise for improving mental health symptoms and strengthening protective factors among children and families affected by HIV in low-resource settings.

  2. Development of clinical contents model markup language for electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yun, Ji-Hyun; Ahn, Sun-Ju; Kim, Yoon

    2012-09-01

    To develop dedicated markup language for clinical contents models (CCM) to facilitate the active use of CCM in electronic health record systems. Based on analysis of the structure and characteristics of CCM in the clinical domain, we designed extensible markup language (XML) based CCM markup language (CCML) schema manually. CCML faithfully reflects CCM in both the syntactic and semantic aspects. As this language is based on XML, it can be expressed and processed in computer systems and can be used in a technology-neutral way. CCML HAS THE FOLLOWING STRENGTHS: it is machine-readable and highly human-readable, it does not require a dedicated parser, and it can be applied for existing electronic health record systems.

  3. Identifying patients with hypertension: a case for auditing electronic health record data.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baus, Adam; Hendryx, Michael; Pollard, Cecil

    2012-01-01

    Problems in the structure, consistency, and completeness of electronic health record data are barriers to outcomes research, quality improvement, and practice redesign. This nonexperimental retrospective study examines the utility of importing de-identified electronic health record data into an external system to identify patients with and at risk for essential hypertension. We find a statistically significant increase in cases based on combined use of diagnostic and free-text coding (mean = 1,256.1, 95% CI 1,232.3-1,279.7) compared to diagnostic coding alone (mean = 1,174.5, 95% CI 1,150.5-1,198.3). While it is not surprising that significantly more patients are identified when broadening search criteria, the implications are critical for quality of care, the movement toward the National Committee for Quality Assurance's Patient-Centered Medical Home program, and meaningful use of electronic health records. Further, we find a statistically significant increase in potential cases based on the last two or more blood pressure readings greater than or equal to 140/90 mm Hg (mean = 1,353.9, 95% CI 1,329.9-1,377.9).

  4. Taming the EHR (Electronic Health Record) - There is Hope

    Science.gov (United States)

    DiAngi, YT; Longhurst, CA; Payne, TH

    2016-01-01

    With increasing diffusion of EHR technology over the last half decade, clinician burnout is rising. As healthcare is a complex and highly regulated field, the rapid and mass adoption of EHR technology has created disruption for highly skilled workers such as clinicians. Although, much has been written about dissatisfaction with the EHR (electronic health record), a paucity of immediate solutions exists in the literature. This article suggests three actionable steps health systems and clinicians can make to expedite gains from and mitigate the effect of the EHR on clinical practice. PMID:27830215

  5. The role of health care experience and consumer information efficacy in shaping privacy and security perceptions of medical records: national consumer survey results.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Patel, Vaishali; Beckjord, Ellen; Moser, Richard P; Hughes, Penelope; Hesse, Bradford W

    2015-04-02

    Providers' adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) is increasing and consumers have expressed concerns about the potential effects of EHRs on privacy and security. Yet, we lack a comprehensive understanding regarding factors that affect individuals' perceptions regarding the privacy and security of their medical information. The aim of this study was to describe national perceptions regarding the privacy and security of medical records and identify a comprehensive set of factors associated with these perceptions. Using a nationally representative 2011-2012 survey, we reported on adults' perceptions regarding privacy and security of medical records and sharing of health information between providers, and whether adults withheld information from a health care provider due to privacy or security concerns. We used multivariable models to examine the association between these outcomes and sociodemographic characteristics, health and health care experience, information efficacy, and technology-related variables. Approximately one-quarter of American adults (weighted n=235,217,323; unweighted n=3959) indicated they were very confident (n=989) and approximately half indicated they were somewhat confident (n=1597) in the privacy of their medical records; we found similar results regarding adults' confidence in the security of medical records (very confident: n=828; somewhat confident: n=1742). In all, 12.33% (520/3904) withheld information from a health care provider and 59.06% (2100/3459) expressed concerns about the security of both faxed and electronic health information. Adjusting for other characteristics, adults who reported higher quality of care had significantly greater confidence in the privacy and security of their medical records and were less likely to withhold information from their health care provider due to privacy or security concerns. Adults with higher information efficacy had significantly greater confidence in the privacy and security of medical

  6. One positive impact of health care reform to physicians: the computer-based patient record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    England, S P

    1993-11-01

    The health care industry is an information-dependent business that will require a new generation of health information systems if successful health care reform is to occur. We critically need integrated clinical management information systems to support the physician and related clinicians at the direct care level, which in turn will have linkages with secondary users of health information such as health payors, regulators, and researchers. The economic dependence of health care industry on the CPR cannot be underestimated, says Jeffrey Ritter. He sees the U.S. health industry as about to enter a bold new age where our records are electronic, our computers are interconnected, and our money is nothing but pulses running across the telephone lines. Hence the United States is now in an age of electronic commerce. Clinical systems reform must begin with the community-based patient chart, which is located in the physician's office, the hospital, and other related health care provider offices. A community-based CPR and CPR system that integrates all providers within a managed care network is the most logical step since all health information begins with the creation of a patient record. Once a community-based CPR system is in place, the physician and his or her clinical associates will have a common patient record upon which all direct providers have access to input and record patient information. Once a community-level CPR system is in place with a community provider network, each physician will have available health information and data processing capability that will finally provide real savings in professional time and effort. Lost patient charts will no longer be a problem. Data input and storage of health information would occur electronically via transcripted text, voice, and document imaging. All electronic clinical information, voice, and graphics could be recalled at any time and transmitted to any terminal location within the health provider network. Hence

  7. Smart Card Based Integrated Electronic Health Record System For Clinical Practice

    OpenAIRE

    N. Anju Latha; B. Rama Murthy; U. Sunitha

    2012-01-01

    Smart cards are used in information technologies as portable integrated devices with data storage and data processing capabilities. As in other fields, smart card use in health systems became popular due to their increased capacity and performance. Smart cards are used as a Electronic Health Record (EHR) Their efficient use with easy and fast data access facilities leads to implementation particularly widespread in hospitals. In this paper, a smart card based Integrated Electronic health Reco...

  8. Acceptance and Usage of Electronic Health Record Systems in Small Medical Practices

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tannan, Ritu

    2012-01-01

    One of the objectives of the U.S. government has been the development of a nationwide health information infrastructure, including adoption and use of an electronic health records (EHR) system. However, a 2008 survey conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics indicated a 41.5% usage of the EHR system by physicians in office-based…

  9. Voice-supported Electronic Health Record for Temporomandibular Joint Disorders

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Hippmann, R.; Dostálová, T.; Zvárová, Jana; Nagy, Miroslav; Seydlová, M.; Hanzlíček, Petr; Kříž, P.; Šmídl, L.; Trmal, J.

    2010-01-01

    Roč. 49, č. 2 (2010), s. 168-172 ISSN 0026-1270 R&D Projects: GA MŠk(CZ) 1M06014 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : electronic health record * structured data entry * dentistry * temporomandibular joint disorder Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science Impact factor: 1.472, year: 2010

  10. Medical Guidelines Presentation and Comparing with Electronic Health Record

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Veselý, Arnošt; Zvárová, Jana; Peleška, Jan; Buchtela, David; Anger, Z.

    2006-01-01

    Roč. 75, č. 3-4 (2006), s. 240-245 ISSN 1386-5056 R&D Projects: GA AV ČR 1ET200300413 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : medical guidelines * electronic health record * GLIF model * reminder facility Subject RIV: IN - Informatics, Computer Science Impact factor: 1.726, year: 2006

  11. Merging Electronic Health Record Data and Genomics for Cardiovascular Research: A Science Advisory From the American Heart Association.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hall, Jennifer L; Ryan, John J; Bray, Bruce E; Brown, Candice; Lanfear, David; Newby, L Kristin; Relling, Mary V; Risch, Neil J; Roden, Dan M; Shaw, Stanley Y; Tcheng, James E; Tenenbaum, Jessica; Wang, Thomas N; Weintraub, William S

    2016-04-01

    The process of scientific discovery is rapidly evolving. The funding climate has influenced a favorable shift in scientific discovery toward the use of existing resources such as the electronic health record. The electronic health record enables long-term outlooks on human health and disease, in conjunction with multidimensional phenotypes that include laboratory data, images, vital signs, and other clinical information. Initial work has confirmed the utility of the electronic health record for understanding mechanisms and patterns of variability in disease susceptibility, disease evolution, and drug responses. The addition of biobanks and genomic data to the information contained in the electronic health record has been demonstrated. The purpose of this statement is to discuss the current challenges in and the potential for merging electronic health record data and genomics for cardiovascular research. © 2016 American Heart Association, Inc.

  12. Continuous event recorders did not affect anxiety or quality of life in patients with palpitations

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Hoefman, Emmy; Boer, Kimberly R.; van Weert, Henk C. P. M.; Reitsma, Johannes B.; Koster, Rudolf W.; Bindels, Patrick J. P.

    2007-01-01

    OBJECTIVES: Palpitations can generate feelings of anxiety and decrease quality of life (QoL) due to fear of a cardiac abnormality. Continuous event recorders (CERs) have proven to be successful in diagnosing causes of palpitations but may affect patient QoL and anxiety. The aim is to determine

  13. The use of biometrics in the Personal Health Record (PHR).

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bonney, Wilfred

    2011-01-01

    The emergence of the Personal Health Record (PHR) has made individual health information more readily accessible to a wide range of users including patients, consumers, practitioners, and healthcare providers. However, increased accessibility of PHR threatens the confidentiality, privacy, and security of personalized health information. Therefore, a need for robust and reliable forms of authentication is of prime concern. The concept of biometric authentication is now highly visible to healthcare providers as a technology to prevent unauthorized access to individual health information. Implementing biometric authentication mechanisms to protect PHR facilitates access control and secure exchange of health information. In this paper, a literature review is used to explore the key benefits, technical barriers, challenges, and ethical implications for using biometric authentication in PHR.

  14. Making texts in electronic health records comprehensible to consumers: a prototype translator.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zeng-Treitler, Qing; Goryachev, Sergey; Kim, Hyeoneui; Keselman, Alla; Rosendale, Douglas

    2007-10-11

    Narrative reports from electronic health records are a major source of content for personal health records. We designed and implemented a prototype text translator to make these reports more comprehensible to consumers. The translator identifies difficult terms, replaces them with easier synonyms, and generates and inserts explanatory texts for them. In feasibility testing, the application was used to translate 9 clinical reports. Majority (68.8%) of text replacements and insertions were deemed correct and helpful by expert review. User evaluation demonstrated a non-statistically significant trend toward better comprehension when translation is provided (p=0.15).

  15. Assessing Commercially Available Personal Health Records for Home Health: Recommendations for Design.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kneale, Laura; Choi, Yong; Demiris, George

    2016-01-01

    Home health nurses and clients experience unmet information needs when transitioning from hospital to home health. Personal health records (PHRs) support consumer-centered information management activities. Previous work has assessed PHRs associated with healthcare providers, but these systems leave home health nurses unable to access necessary information. To evaluate the ability of publically available PHRs to accept, manage, and share information from a home health case study. Two researchers accessed the publically available PHRs on myPHR.com, and attempted to enter, manage, and share the case study data. We qualitatively described the PHR features, and identified gaps between the case study information and PHR functionality. Eighteen PHRs were identified in our initial search. Seven systems met our inclusion criteria, and are included in this review. The PHRs were able to accept basic medical information. Gaps occurred when entering, managing, and/or sharing data from the acute care and home health episodes. The PHRs that were reviewed were unable to effectively manage the case study information. Therefore, increasing consumer health literacy through these systems may be difficult. The PHRs that we reviewed were also unable to electronically share their data. The gap between the existing functionality and the information needs from the case study may make these PHRs difficult to use for home health environments. Additional work is needed to increase the functionality of the PHR systems to better fit the data needs of home health clients.

  16. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Part 2

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.

  17. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Part 1

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.

  18. Standards for collection of identifying information for health record keeping

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Carpenter, M.; Fair, M.E.; Lalonde, P.; Scott, T.

    1988-09-01

    A new recommended guideline for the standard data collection of individual identifying information has been developed and tested by Statistics Canada. The purpose of developing a standard method is to improve health record keeping in Canada: in particular for long term medical follow-up studies of individuals exposed to potentially hazardous agents for detection of possible health risks or delayed harm, e.g. individuals exposed to radiation through occupations, the environment, emergencies, or therapeutic practice. A data collection standard is also useful for epidemiological follow-up studies for other occupation groups such as chemical workers and miners, or for lifestyle, genetic and other studies. Statistics Canada, Health Division, Occupational and Environmental Health Research Unit (OEHRU), from their experience with long term health studies using the Canadian Mortality Data Base, has prepared a 'Data Collection Package' to include the developed and tested data collection guideline. It is anticipated this will help produce more thorough and comparable on-going record keeping while saving costs and time for many organizations e.g. Atomic Energy Control Board licensees who report radiation doses to the National Dose Registry, as well as for other companies and organizations across the country where long term medical follow-up studies are anticipated now or in the future. It may also allow for broader industrial, national and international comparisons. The guideline consists of a two page Individual Identity Summary (IIS): the first page for completion by the individual/employee to give unique identifying information; the second page for the study organizer/employer to include essential additional information (work history etc.). A third optional page can be used by organizations wishing to collect data on children. The Data Collection Package also includes brief explanatory notes, a suggested file record layout and detailed computer coding advice for entering

  19. Health information technology: integration of clinical workflow into meaningful use of electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bowens, Felicia M; Frye, Patricia A; Jones, Warren A

    2010-10-01

    This article examines the role that clinical workflow plays in successful implementation and meaningful use of electronic health record (EHR) technology in ambulatory care. The benefits and barriers of implementing EHRs in ambulatory care settings are discussed. The researchers conclude that widespread adoption and meaningful use of EHR technology rely on the successful integration of health information technology (HIT) into clinical workflow. Without successful integration of HIT into clinical workflow, clinicians in today's ambulatory care settings will continue to resist adoption and implementation of EHR technology.

  20. Feasibility of utilizing a commercial eye tracker to assess electronic health record use during patient simulation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gold, Jeffrey Allen; Stephenson, Laurel E; Gorsuch, Adriel; Parthasarathy, Keshav; Mohan, Vishnu

    2016-09-01

    Numerous reports describe unintended consequences of electronic health record implementation. Having previously described physicians' failures to recognize patient safety issues within our electronic health record simulation environment, we now report on our use of eye and screen-tracking technology to understand factors associated with poor error recognition during an intensive care unit-based electronic health record simulation. We linked performance on the simulation to standard eye and screen-tracking readouts including number of fixations, saccades, mouse clicks and screens visited. In addition, we developed an overall Composite Eye Tracking score which measured when, where and how often each safety item was viewed. For 39 participants, the Composite Eye Tracking score correlated with performance on the simulation (p = 0.004). Overall, the improved performance was associated with a pattern of rapid scanning of data manifested by increased number of screens visited (p = 0.001), mouse clicks (p = 0.03) and saccades (p = 0.004). Eye tracking can be successfully integrated into electronic health record-based simulation and provides a surrogate measure of cognitive decision making and electronic health record usability. © The Author(s) 2015.

  1. The dynamic relationship between emotional and physical states: an observational study of personal health records

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lee YS

    2017-02-01

    Full Text Available Ye-Seul Lee,1 Won-Mo Jung,1 Hyunchul Jang,2 Sanghyun Kim,2 Sun-Yong Chung,3 Younbyoung Chae1 1Acupuncture and Meridian Science Research Center, College of Korean Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, 2Mibyeong Research Center, Korean Institute of Oriental Medicine, Daejeon, 3Department of Neuropsychiatry, College of Korean Medicine, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea Objectives: Recently, there has been increasing interest in preventing and managing diseases both inside and outside medical institutions, and these concerns have supported the development of the individual Personal Health Record (PHR. Thus, the current study created a mobile platform called “Mind Mirror” to evaluate psychological and physical conditions and investigated whether PHRs would be a useful tool for assessment of the dynamic relationship between the emotional and physical conditions of an individual.Methods: Mind Mirror was used to collect 30 days of observational data about emotional valence and the physical states of pain and fatigue from 20 healthy participants, and these data were used to analyze the dynamic relationship between emotional and physical conditions. Additionally, based on the cross-correlations between these three parameters, a multilevel multivariate regression model (mixed linear model [MLM] was implemented.Results: The strongest cross-correlation between emotional and physical conditions was at lag 0, which implies that emotion and body condition changed concurrently. In the MLM, emotional valence was negatively associated with fatigue (β =-0.233, P<0.001, fatigue was positively associated with pain (β =0.250, P<0.001, and pain was positively associated with fatigue (β =0.398, P<0.001.Conclusion: Our study showed that emotional valence and one’s physical condition negatively influenced one another, while fatigue and pain positively affected each other. These findings suggest that the mind and body interact instantaneously, in

  2. How Does What I Eat Affect My Oral Health?

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... be just as satisfying and better for your dental health. One caution: malnutrition (bad nutrition) can result from too much nourishment as easily ... dentist if you're not sure how your nutrition (diet) may affect your oral health. Conditions such as tooth loss, pain or joint ...

  3. Implementing electronic health records in hospitals : a systematic literature review

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Boonstra, A.; Versluis, Arie; Vos, J.F.J.

    2014-01-01

    Background: The literature on implementing Electronic Health Records (EHR) in hospitals is very diverse. The objective of this study is to create an overview of the existing literature on EHR implementation in hospitals and to identify generally applicable findings and lessons for implementers.

  4. Views on health information sharing and privacy from primary care practices using electronic medical records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Perera, Gihan; Holbrook, Anne; Thabane, Lehana; Foster, Gary; Willison, Donald J

    2011-02-01

    To determine how patients and physicians balance the perceived benefits and harms of sharing electronic health data for patient care and for secondary purposes. Before-after survey of patients and providers in practices using electronic medical records (EMRs) enrolled in a clinical trial in Ontario, Canada. Outcomes were measured using the Health Information Privacy Questionnaire (HIPQ) at baseline and end of study. Thirteen questions in 4 general domains investigated attitudes towards the privacy of EMRs, outsider's use of patient's health information, the sharing of patient's information within the health care system, and the overall perception of benefits versus harms of computerization in health care. 511 patients (mean age 60.3 years, 49.6% female) and 46 physicians (mean age 47.2 years, 37.0% female) participated. Most (>90%) supported the computerized sharing of the patient's health records among their health care professionals and to provide clinical advice. Fewer agreed that the patient's de-identified information should be shared outside of the health care circle (records can be keep more private than paper records (38-50%). Overall, a majority (58% patients, 70% physicians) believed that the benefits of computerization were greater than the risks of confidentiality loss. This was especially true for patients who were frequent computer users. While these primary care physicians and their patients valued the clinical features of EMRs, a substantial minority have concerns about the secondary use of de-identified information. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  5. Risk assessment of integrated electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bjornsson, Bjarni Thor; Sigurdardottir, Gudlaug; Stefansson, Stefan Orri

    2010-01-01

    The paper describes the security concerns related to Electronic Health Records (EHR) both in registration of data and integration of systems. A description of the current state of EHR systems in Iceland is provided, along with the Ministry of Health's future vision and plans. New legislation provides the opportunity for increased integration of EHRs and further collaboration between institutions. Integration of systems, along with greater availability and access to EHR data, requires increased security awareness since additional risks are introduced. The paper describes the core principles of information security as it applies to EHR systems and data. The concepts of confidentiality, integrity, availability, accountability and traceability are introduced and described. The paper discusses the legal requirements and importance of performing risk assessment for EHR data. Risk assessment methodology according to the ISO/IEC 27001 information security standard is described with examples on how it is applied to EHR systems.

  6. The effect of electronic health record software design on resident documentation and compliance with evidence-based medicine.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yasaira Rodriguez Torres

    Full Text Available This study aimed to determine the role of electronic health record software in resident education by evaluating documentation of 30 elements extracted from the American Academy of Ophthalmology Dry Eye Syndrome Preferred Practice Pattern. The Kresge Eye Institute transitioned to using electronic health record software in June 2013. We evaluated the charts of 331 patients examined in the resident ophthalmology clinic between September 1, 2011, and March 31, 2014, for an initial evaluation for dry eye syndrome. We compared documentation rates for the 30 evidence-based elements between electronic health record chart note templates among the ophthalmology residents. Overall, significant changes in documentation occurred when transitioning to a new version of the electronic health record software with average compliance ranging from 67.4% to 73.6% (p 90% in 13 elements while Electronic Health Record B had high compliance (>90% in 11 elements. The presence of dialog boxes was responsible for significant changes in documentation of adnexa, puncta, proptosis, skin examination, contact lens wear, and smoking exposure. Significant differences in documentation were correlated with electronic health record template design rather than individual resident or residents' year in training. Our results show that electronic health record template design influences documentation across all resident years. Decreased documentation likely results from "mouse click fatigue" as residents had to access multiple dialog boxes to complete documentation. These findings highlight the importance of EHR template design to improve resident documentation and integration of evidence-based medicine into their clinical notes.

  7. Health Promotion Behaviors of Women and Affecting Factors

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Naile Bilgili

    2009-12-01

    Full Text Available AIM: Women should be healthy and have health promotion behaviors, so they can accomplish both their maternal and social tasks. This descriptive study was conducted to determine the healthy life-style behaviors of married women and the factors which could affect those behaviors. METHOD: The population comprised all married women older than 15 years and who live in Ankara Kale region. Three hundred-sixty five married women were included in the study. The questionnaire form and the healthy life-style behaviors scale was used for data collection. RESULTS: The mean score taken from scale was 112.2±19.4. The scores of the women who graduated from middle school / high school, who have sufficient income and good socio-economic status, who have a perception of physical health fairly good and who have any chronic disease in their families, have significantly higher mean scores from healthy life-style behaviors scale and subgroups (p<0.05 CONCLUSION: Health promotion behaviors of the women was low and some factors like education level, income, socioeconomic status, perception of health, having any chronic illness and using regular medicine affected healthy life-style behaviors. It is recommended that nurses, who have education and consultation roles, should inform the women about health promotion behaviors and encourage them to use that information in their lives. [TAF Prev Med Bull 2009; 8(6.000: 497-502

  8. The Camden & Islington Research Database: Using electronic mental health records for research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Werbeloff, Nomi; Osborn, David P J; Patel, Rashmi; Taylor, Matthew; Stewart, Robert; Broadbent, Matthew; Hayes, Joseph F

    2018-01-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) are widely used in mental health services. Case registers using EHRs from secondary mental healthcare have the potential to deliver large-scale projects evaluating mental health outcomes in real-world clinical populations. We describe the Camden and Islington NHS Foundation Trust (C&I) Research Database which uses the Clinical Record Interactive Search (CRIS) tool to extract and de-identify routinely collected clinical information from a large UK provider of secondary mental healthcare, and demonstrate its capabilities to answer a clinical research question regarding time to diagnosis and treatment of bipolar disorder. The C&I Research Database contains records from 108,168 mental health patients, of which 23,538 were receiving active care. The characteristics of the patient population are compared to those of the catchment area, of London, and of England as a whole. The median time to diagnosis of bipolar disorder was 76 days (interquartile range: 17-391) and median time to treatment was 37 days (interquartile range: 5-194). Compulsory admission under the UK Mental Health Act was associated with shorter intervals to diagnosis and treatment. Prior diagnoses of other psychiatric disorders were associated with longer intervals to diagnosis, though prior diagnoses of schizophrenia and related disorders were associated with decreased time to treatment. The CRIS tool, developed by the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (SLaM) Biomedical Research Centre (BRC), functioned very well at C&I. It is reassuring that data from different organizations deliver similar results, and that applications developed in one Trust can then be successfully deployed in another. The information can be retrieved in a quicker and more efficient fashion than more traditional methods of health research. The findings support the secondary use of EHRs for large-scale mental health research in naturalistic samples and settings investigated across large

  9. Designing for Underserved Populations: Constraints and Requirements of Personal Health Record Systems

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2009-02-11

    In this podcast, Dr. Thomas Horan discusses how language, literacy, and access barriers can be overcome with electronic Personal Health Record (PHR) systems to improve health among the most vulnerable, isolated, and underserved populations.  Created: 2/11/2009 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service (CCHIS), Healthy Healthcare Settings Goal Team, Office of Strategy and Innovation.   Date Released: 9/2/2009.

  10. Rapid progress or lengthy process? electronic personal health records in mental health

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Denis Mike

    2011-07-01

    Full Text Available Abstract A major objective of many healthcare providers is to increase patients' participation in their own care. The introduction of electronic personal health records (ePHRs may help to achieve this. An ePHR is an electronic database of an individual's health information, accessible to and maintained by the patient. ePHRs are very much in vogue, with an increasing number of studies reporting their potential utility as well as cost. However, the vast majority of these studies focus on general healthcare. Little attempt has been made to document the specific problems which might occur throughout the implementation of ePHRs in mental health. This review identifies such concerns through an electronic search of the literature. Several potential difficulties are highlighted and addressed, including access to information technology, identifying relevant populations and the handling of sensitive information. Special attention is paid to the concept of 'empowerment' and what this means in relation to ePHRs.

  11. Privacy, consent, and the electronic mental health record: The Person vs. the System.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Clemens, Norman A

    2012-01-01

    As electronic health record systems become widely adopted and proposals are advanced to integrate mental health with general health systems, there is mounting pressure to include mental health information on the same basis as general health information without any requirement for active, individual patient consent to do so. A prime example is the current effort to change the Mental Health Information Act of the District of Columbia, which has, up till now, stood as a model for protection of the privacy of patients with mental illness, the requirement of informed consent for disclosure of health information, and delimitation of minimum necessary disclosure. Mental health information is exceptionally sensitive and potentially damaging if privacy is breached, which makes patients reluctant to seek treatment if they cannot be assured of confidentiality. In addition, there have been spectacular breaches of the security of large electronic health record databases. A subtle but more likely threat is the possibility that mental health information in networks could be fully accessible to all of the patient's providers in a network, not just those for whom it would be necessary to the patient's care. In the 1996 Supreme Court decision in Jaffee v. Redmond, the high court recognized that confidentiality is essential for patients to engage in effective psychotherapy, and HIPAA maintains that special status in the protection of psychotherapy notes as well as explicitly stating that it defers to state laws that are more protective of confidentiality than is HIPAA itself. Highly sensitive information also exists in mental health records aside from psychotherapy notes. Any change in the laws that govern informed consent for disclosure of mental health information must take these factors into account. Specifically, the author opposes any change that would assume tacit consent to release mental health information through an electronic health information exchange in the absence of a

  12. Electronic Health Records: VAs Efforts Raise Concerns about Interoperability Goals and Measures, Duplication with DOD, and Future Plans

    Science.gov (United States)

    2016-07-13

    ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS VA’s Efforts Raise Concerns about Interoperability Goals and Measures, Duplication with DOD...Agencies, Committee on Appropriations, U.S. Senate July 13, 2016 ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS VA’s Efforts Raise Concerns about Interoperability Goals...initiatives with the Department of Defense (DOD) that were intended to advance the ability of the two departments to share electronic health records ,

  13. Benefits of Implementing and Improving Collection of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Data in Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bosse, Jordon D; Leblanc, Raeann G; Jackman, Kasey; Bjarnadottir, Ragnhildur I

    2018-06-01

    Individuals in lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities experience several disparities in physical and mental health (eg, cardiovascular disease and depression), as well as difficulty accessing care that is compassionate and relevant to their unique needs. Access to care is compromised in part due to inadequate information systems that fail to capture identity data. Beginning in January 2018, meaningful use criteria dictate that electronic health records have the capability to collect data related to sexual orientation and gender identity of patients. Nurse informaticists play a vital role in the process of developing new electronic health records that are sensitive to the needs and identities of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities. Improved collection of sexual orientation and gender identity data will advance the identification of health disparities experienced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender populations. More inclusive electronic health records will allow providers to monitor risk behavior, assess progress toward the reduction of disparities, and provide healthcare that is patient and family centered. Concrete suggestions for the modification of electronic health record systems are presented, as well as how nurse informaticists may be able to bridge gaps in provider knowledge and discomfort through interprofessional collaboration when implementing changes in electronic health records.

  14. Assessing the privacy policies in mobile personal health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zapata, Belén Cruz; Hernández Niñirola, Antonio; Fernández-Alemán, José Luis; Toval, Ambrosio

    2014-01-01

    The huge increase in the number and use of smartphones and tablets has led health service providers to take an interest in mHealth. Popular mobile app markets like Apple App Store or Google Play contain thousands of health applications. Although mobile personal health records (mPHRs) have a number of benefits, important challenges appear in the form of adoption barriers. Security and privacy have been identified as part of these barriers and should be addressed. This paper analyzes and assesses a total of 24 free mPHRs for Android and iOS. Characteristics regarding privacy and security were extracted from the HIPAA. The results show important differences in both the mPHRs and the characteristics analyzed. A questionnaire containing six questions concerning privacy policies was defined. Our questionnaire may assist developers and stakeholders to evaluate the security and privacy of their mPHRs.

  15. The role of affect and cognition in health decision making.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Keer, Mario; van den Putte, Bas; Neijens, Peter

    2010-03-01

    Both affective and cognitive evaluations of behaviours have been allocated various positions in theoretical models of decision making. Most often, they have been studied as direct determinants of either intention or overall evaluation, but these two possible positions have never been compared. The aim of this study was to determine whether affective and cognitive evaluations influence intention directly, or whether their influence is mediated by overall evaluation. A sample of 300 university students filled in questionnaires on their affective, cognitive, and overall evaluations in respect of 20 health behaviours. The data were interpreted using mediation analyses with the application of path modelling. Both affective and cognitive evaluations were found to have significantly predicted intention. The influence of affective evaluation was largely direct for each of the behaviours studied, whereas that of cognitive evaluation was partially direct and partially mediated by overall evaluation. These results indicate that decisions regarding the content of persuasive communication (affective vs. cognitive) are highly dependent on the theoretical model chosen. It is suggested that affective evaluation should be included as a direct determinant of intention in theories of decision making when predicting health behaviours.

  16. Managing terminology assets in Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Abrams, Kelly; Schneider, Sue; Scichilone, Rita

    2009-01-01

    Electronic Health Record (EHR)systems rely on standard terminologies and classification systems that require both Information Technology (IT) and Information Management (IM) skills. Convergence of perspectives is necessary for effective terminology asset management including evaluation for use, maintenance and intersection with software applications. Multiple terminologies are necessary for patient care communication and data capture within EHRs and other information management tasks. Terminology asset management encompasses workflow and operational context as well as IT specifications and software application run time requirements. This paper identifies the tasks, skills and collaboration of IM and IT approaches for terminology asset management.

  17. Consumer attitudes toward personal health records in a beacon community.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Patel, Vaishali N; Abramson, Erika; Edwards, Alison M; Cheung, Melissa A; Dhopeshwarkar, Rina V; Kaushal, Rainu

    2011-04-01

    To characterize consumers' attitudes about personal health records (PHRs), electronic tools that enable consumers to securely access, manage, and share their health information, in a community participating in health information technology initiatives. Cross-sectional study. A random-digit-dial telephone survey about PHRs was conducted among adult residents of New York State's greater Buffalo region. Multivariate regression analyses identified factors associated with potential PHR use. We obtained a 79% (n = 200) response rate. Many respondents (70%) would potentially use PHRs. Consumers wanted PHRs to incorporate an array of information, including immunization records (89%) and providers visited (88%). They expressed interest in several online activities, including accessing their family members' healthcare information (71%). Potential PHR use was associated with perceptions that PHRs would improve privacy and security of medical information (odds ratio [OR] 4.7; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.1, 20.1), understanding regarding health (OR 3.7; 95% CI 1.3, 11.1), and overall quality of care (OR 3.6; 95% CI 1.2, 10.6). Potential PHR use was associated with annual household income of more than $30,000 (OR 3.9; 95% CI 1.3, 11.9) and experience looking up health information online (OR 3.0; 95% CI 1.1, 8.1). Consumers expressed great interest in using PHRs and wanted comprehensive PHRs. However, the "digital divide" between those with varying levels of Internet experience and concerns about PHRs’ effect on privacy and security of medical information may limit use. Designing PHRs that incorporate consumer preferences and developing policies that address these barriers may increase consumers' PHR use.

  18. Mining Electronic Health Records using Linked Data.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Odgers, David J; Dumontier, Michel

    2015-01-01

    Meaningful Use guidelines have pushed the United States Healthcare System to adopt electronic health record systems (EHRs) at an unprecedented rate. Hospitals and medical centers are providing access to clinical data via clinical data warehouses such as i2b2, or Stanford's STRIDE database. In order to realize the potential of using these data for translational research, clinical data warehouses must be interoperable with standardized health terminologies, biomedical ontologies, and growing networks of Linked Open Data such as Bio2RDF. Applying the principles of Linked Data, we transformed a de-identified version of the STRIDE into a semantic clinical data warehouse containing visits, labs, diagnoses, prescriptions, and annotated clinical notes. We demonstrate the utility of this system though basic cohort selection, phenotypic profiling, and identification of disease genes. This work is significant in that it demonstrates the feasibility of using semantic web technologies to directly exploit existing biomedical ontologies and Linked Open Data.

  19. Negation scope and spelling variation for text-mining of Danish electronic patient records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Thomas, Cecilia Engel; Jensen, Peter Bjødstrup; Werge, Thomas

    2014-01-01

    Electronic patient records are a potentially rich data source for knowledge extraction in biomedical research. Here we present a method based on the ICD10 system for text-mining of Danish health records. We have evaluated how adding functionalities to a baseline text-mining tool affected...

  20. Educating Health Professionals about the Electronic Health Record (EHR: Removing the Barriers to Adoption

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Paule Bellwood

    2011-03-01

    Full Text Available In the healthcare industry we have had a significant rise in the use of electronic health records (EHRs in health care settings (e.g. hospital, clinic, physician office and home. There are three main barriers that have arisen to the adoption of these technologies: (1 a shortage of health professional faculty who are familiar with EHRs and related technologies, (2 a shortage of health informatics specialists who can implement these technologies, and (3 poor access to differing types of EHR software. In this paper we outline a novel solution to these barriers: the development of a web portal that provides facility and health professional students with access to multiple differing types of EHRs over the WWW. The authors describe how the EHR is currently being used in educational curricula and how it has overcome many of these barriers. The authors also briefly describe the strengths and limitations of the approach.

  1. Factors affecting patients' online health information-seeking behaviours: The role of the Patient Health Engagement (PHE) Model.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Graffigna, Guendalina; Barello, Serena; Bonanomi, Andrea; Riva, Giuseppe

    2017-10-01

    To identify the variables affecting patients' online health information-seeking behaviours by examining the relationships between patient participation in their healthcare and online health information-seeking behaviours. A cross-sectional survey of Italian chronic patients (N=352) was conducted on patient's online health information-seeking behaviours and patient participation-related variables. Structural equation modeling analysis was conducted to test the hypothesis. This study showed how the healthcare professionals' ability to support chronic patients' autonomy affect patients' participation in their healthcare and patient's online health information-seeking behaviours. However, results do not confirm that the frequency of patients' online health-information seeking behavior has an impact on their adherence to medical prescriptions. Assuming a psychosocial perspective, we have discussed how patients' engagement - conceived as the level of their emotional elaboration of the health condition - affects the patients' ability to search for and manage online health information. To improve the effectiveness of patients' online health information-seeking behaviours and to enhance the effectiveness of technological interventions in this field, healthcare providers should target assessing and improving patient engagement and patient empowerment in their healthcare. It is important that health professionals acknowledge patients' online health information-seeking behaviours that they discuss the information offered by patients and guide them to reliable and accurate web sources. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  2. The health literacy demands of electronic personal health records (e-PHRs): An integrative review to inform future inclusive research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hemsley, Bronwyn; Rollo, Megan; Georgiou, Andrew; Balandin, Susan; Hill, Sophie

    2018-01-01

    To integrate the findings of research on electronic personal health records (e-PHRs) for an understanding of their health literacy demands on both patients and providers. We sought peer-reviewed primary research in English addressing the health literacy demands of e-PHRs that are online and allow patients any degree of control or input to the record. A synthesis of three theoretical models was used to frame the analysis of 24 studies. e-PHRs pose a wide range of health literacy demands on both patients and health service providers. Patient participation in e-PHRs relies not only on their level of education and computer literacy, and attitudes to sharing health information, but also upon their executive function, verbal expression, and understanding of spoken and written language. The multiple health literacy demands of e-PHRs must be considered when implementing population-wide initiatives for storing and sharing health information using these systems. The health literacy demands of e-PHRs are high and could potentially exclude many patients unless strategies are adopted to support their use of these systems. Developing strategies for all patients to meet or reduce the high health literacy demands of e-PHRs will be important in population-wide implementation. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  3. Testing the Electronic Personal Health Record Acceptance Model by Nurses for Managing Their Own Health

    Science.gov (United States)

    Trinkoff, A.M.; Storr, C.L.; Wilson, M.L.; Gurses, A.P.

    2015-01-01

    Summary Background To our knowledge, no evidence is available on health care professionals’ use of electronic personal health records (ePHRs) for their health management. We therefore focused on nurses’ personal use of ePHRs using a modified technology acceptance model. Objectives To examine (1) the psychometric properties of the ePHR acceptance model, (2) the associations of perceived usefulness, ease of use, data privacy and security protection, and perception of self as health-promoting role models to nurses’ own ePHR use, and (3) the moderating influences of age, chronic illness and medication use, and providers’ use of electronic health record (EHRs) on the associations between the ePHR acceptance constructs and ePHR use. Methods A convenience sample of registered nurses, those working in one of 12 hospitals in the Maryland and Washington, DC areas and members of the nursing informatics community (AMIA and HIMSS), were invited to respond to an anonymous online survey; 847 responded. Multiple logistic regression identified associations between the model constructs and ePHR use, and the moderating effect. Results Overall, ePHRs were used by 47%. Sufficient reliability for all scales was found. Three constructs were significantly related to nurses’ own ePHR use after adjusting for covariates: usefulness, data privacy and security protection, and health-promoting role model. Nurses with providers that used EHRs who perceived a higher level of data privacy and security protection had greater odds of ePHR use than those whose providers did not use EHRs. Older nurses with a higher self-perception as health-promoting role models had greater odds of ePHR use than younger nurses. Conclusions Nurses who use ePHRs for their personal health might promote adoption by the general public by serving as health-promoting role models. They can contribute to improvements in patient education and ePHR design, and serve as crucial resources when working with their

  4. Bidirectional RNN for Medical Event Detection in Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jagannatha, Abhyuday N; Yu, Hong

    2016-06-01

    Sequence labeling for extraction of medical events and their attributes from unstructured text in Electronic Health Record (EHR) notes is a key step towards semantic understanding of EHRs. It has important applications in health informatics including pharmacovigilance and drug surveillance. The state of the art supervised machine learning models in this domain are based on Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) with features calculated from fixed context windows. In this application, we explored recurrent neural network frameworks and show that they significantly out-performed the CRF models.

  5. Electronic Health Record developed by the Internet technology

    OpenAIRE

    吉原, 博幸; Yoshihara, Hiroyuki

    1998-01-01

    Installation of the order entry system had been done in the college hospital. However, Installation of the order entry system has just begun in middle sized hospitals. On the other hand, at the middle sized hospitals which does not equipped with the order entry system, the administrator is considering to install the electronic health record system rather than to install the order entry system, In case of small hospitals, there is no merit of installing the order entry system. So, many young d...

  6. Health symptoms in residents living near shale gas activity: A retrospective record review from the Environmental Health Project

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Beth Weinberger

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available Increasing evidence demonstrates an association between health symptoms and exposure to unconventional natural gas development (UNGD. The purpose of this study is to describe the health of adults in communities with intense UNGD who presented for evaluation of symptoms. Records of 135 structured health assessments conducted between February 2012 and October 2015 were reviewed retrospectively. Publicly available data were used to determine proximity to gas wells. Analysis was restricted to records of adults who lived within 1km of a well in Pennsylvania and denied employment in the gas industry (n=51. Symptoms in each record were reviewed by a physician. Symptoms that could be explained by pre-existing or concurrent conditions or social history and those that began or worsened prior to exposure were excluded. Exposure was calculated using date of well drilling within 1km. The number of symptoms/participant ranged from 0 to 19 (mean=6.2; SD=5.1. Symptoms most commonly reported were: sleep disruption, headache, throat irritation, stress or anxiety, cough, shortness of breath, sinus problems, fatigue, nausea, and wheezing. These results are consistent with findings of prior studies using self-report without physician review. In comparison, our results are strengthened by the collection of health data by a health care provider, critical review of symptoms for possible alternative causes, and confirmation of timing of exposure to unconventional natural gas well relative to symptom onset or exacerbation. Our findings confirm earlier studies and add to the growing body of evidence of the association between symptoms and exposure to UNGD. Keywords: Hydraulic fracturing, Health, Fracking, Shale gas, Unconventional gas

  7. Association between personal health record enrollment and patient loyalty.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Turley, Marianne; Garrido, Terhilda; Lowenthal, Alex; Zhou, Yi Yvonne

    2012-07-01

    To examine the association between patient loyalty, as measured by member retention in the health plan, and access to My Health Manager (MHM), Kaiser Permanente's PHR, which is linked to its electronic health record, KP HealthConnect. We conducted a retrospective cohort observational quality improvement project from the third quarter of 2005 to the fourth quarter of 2008 for approximately 394,000 Kaiser Permanente Northwest members. To control for self-selection bias, we used propensity scores to perform exact 1-to-1 matching without replacement between MHM users and nonusers. We estimated retention rates of the matched data and assessed the association between MHM use and retention versus voluntary termination. We also estimated odds ratios of significant variables impacting member retention. The probability of remaining a member or being involuntarily terminated versus voluntary termination was 96.7% for users (95% confidence interval [CI], 96.6%-96.7%) and 92.2% for nonusers (95% CI, 92.1%-92.4%; P loyalty, retention is critical to healthcare organizations.

  8. Open source electronic health records and chronic disease management.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Goldwater, Jason C; Kwon, Nancy J; Nathanson, Ashley; Muckle, Alison E; Brown, Alexa; Cornejo, Kerri

    2014-02-01

    To study and report on the use of open source electronic health records (EHR) to assist with chronic care management within safety net medical settings, such as community health centers (CHC). The study was conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago from April to September 2010. The NORC team undertook a comprehensive environmental scan, including a literature review, a dozen key informant interviews using a semistructured protocol, and a series of site visits to CHC that currently use an open source EHR. Two of the sites chosen by NORC were actively using an open source EHR to assist in the redesign of their care delivery system to support more effective chronic disease management. This included incorporating the chronic care model into an CHC and using the EHR to help facilitate its elements, such as care teams for patients, in addition to maintaining health records on indigent populations, such as tuberculosis status on homeless patients. The ability to modify the open-source EHR to adapt to the CHC environment and leverage the ecosystem of providers and users to assist in this process provided significant advantages in chronic care management. Improvements in diabetes management, controlled hypertension and increases in tuberculosis vaccinations were assisted through the use of these open source systems. The flexibility and adaptability of open source EHR demonstrated its utility and viability in the provision of necessary and needed chronic disease care among populations served by CHC.

  9. Formalized Medical Guidelines and a Structured Electronic Health Record.

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Peleška, Jan; Anger, Z.; Buchtela, David; Šebesta, K.; Tomečková, Marie; Veselý, Arnošt; Zvára, K.; Zvárová, Jana

    2005-01-01

    Roč. 11, - (2005), s. 4652-4656 ISSN 1727-1983. [EMBEC'05. European Medical and Biomedical Conference /3./. Prague, 20.11.2005-25.11.2005] R&D Projects: GA AV ČR 1ET200300413 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z10300504 Keywords : formalization of guidelines in cardilogy * GLIF model * structure electronic health record * algorithm in cardiovascular diagnostics and treatment Subject RIV: BD - Theory of Information

  10. Use and records of child health handbook focused on growth and development.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Palombo, Claudia Nery Teixeira; Duarte, Luciane Simões; Fujimori, Elizabeth; Toriyama, Aurea Tamami Minagawa

    2014-08-01

    Objective To evaluate the use and records of the Child Health Handbook (CHH), especially growth and development. Method Cross-sectional study with 358 mother-child pairs registered in 12 Primary Health Centers (PHCs) of a small municipality. Mothers were interviewed at the PHC from February to April 2013 using a questionnaire. Data analysis was done using WHO Anthro software, Epi InfoTM and Stata. Results Fifty-three percent of the mothers were carrying the CHH at the time of the interview, similar to the proportion of mothers who were instructed to bring the CHH to health appointments. Annotations in the CHH during the visits were reported by 49%. The vaccination schedule was completed in 97% of the CHH, but only 9% and 8% of the CHH, respectively, contained growth charts and properly completed developmental milestones. Conclusion Low rates of use and unsatisfactory record-keeping in the CHH reinforce the need for investment in professional training and community awareness for the CHH to become an effective instrument of promotion of child health.

  11. Use and records of child health handbook focused on growth and development

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Claudia Nery Teixeira Palombo

    2014-08-01

    Full Text Available Objective To evaluate the use and records of the Child Health Handbook (CHH, especially growth and development. Method Cross-sectional study with 358 mother-child pairs registered in 12 Primary Health Centers (PHCs of a small municipality. Mothers were interviewed at the PHC from February to April 2013 using a questionnaire. Data analysis was done using WHO Anthro software, Epi InfoTM and Stata. Results Fifty-three percent of the mothers were carrying the CHH at the time of the interview, similar to the proportion of mothers who were instructed to bring the CHH to health appointments. Annotations in the CHH during the visits were reported by 49%. The vaccination schedule was completed in 97% of the CHH, but only 9% and 8% of the CHH, respectively, contained growth charts and properly completed developmental milestones. Conclusion Low rates of use and unsatisfactory record-keeping in the CHH reinforce the need for investment in professional training and community awareness for the CHH to become an effective instrument of promotion of child health.

  12. Agreement between questionnaire and medical records on some health and socioeconomic problems among poisoning cases

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fathelrahman Ahmed I

    2009-09-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background The main objective of the present study was to evaluate the agreement between questionnaire and medical records on some health and socioeconomic problems among poisoning cases. Methods Cross-sectional sample of 100 poisoning cases consecutively admitted to the Hospital Pulau Pinang, Malaysia during the period from September 2003 to February 2004 were studied. Data on health and socioeconomic problems were collected both by self-administered questionnaire and from medical records. Agreement between the two sets of data was assessed by calculating the concordance rate, Kappa (k and PABAK. McNemar statistic was used to test differences between categories. Results Data collected by questionnaire and medical records showed excellent agreement on the "marital status"; good agreements on "chronic illness", "psychiatric illness", and "previous history of poisoning"; and fair agreements on "at least one health problem", and "boy-girl friends problem". PABAK values suggest better agreements' measures. Conclusion There were excellent to good agreements between questionnaire and medical records on the marital status and most of the health problems and fair to poor agreements on the majority of socioeconomic problems. The implications of those findings were discussed.

  13. Adoption of Electronic Health Records: A Roadmap for India

    Science.gov (United States)

    2016-01-01

    Objectives The objective of the study was to create a roadmap for the adoption of Electronic Health Record (EHR) in India based an analysis of the strategies of other countries and national scenarios of ICT use in India. Methods The strategies for adoption of EHR in other countries were analyzed to find the crucial steps taken. Apart from reports collected from stakeholders in the country, the study relied on the experience of the author in handling several e-health projects. Results It was found that there are four major areas where the countries considered have made substantial efforts: ICT infrastructure, Policy & regulations, Standards & interoperability, and Research, development & education. A set of crucial activities were identified in each area. Based on the analysis, a roadmap is suggested. It includes the creation of a secure health network; health information exchange; and the use of open-source software, a national health policy, privacy laws, an agency for health IT standards, R&D, human resource development, etc. Conclusions Although some steps have been initiated, several new steps need to be taken up for the successful adoption of EHR. It requires a coordinated effort from all the stakeholders. PMID:27895957

  14. Adoption of Electronic Health Records: A Roadmap for India.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Srivastava, Sunil Kumar

    2016-10-01

    The objective of the study was to create a roadmap for the adoption of Electronic Health Record (EHR) in India based an analysis of the strategies of other countries and national scenarios of ICT use in India. The strategies for adoption of EHR in other countries were analyzed to find the crucial steps taken. Apart from reports collected from stakeholders in the country, the study relied on the experience of the author in handling several e-health projects. It was found that there are four major areas where the countries considered have made substantial efforts: ICT infrastructure, Policy & regulations, Standards & interoperability, and Research, development & education. A set of crucial activities were identified in each area. Based on the analysis, a roadmap is suggested. It includes the creation of a secure health network; health information exchange; and the use of open-source software, a national health policy, privacy laws, an agency for health IT standards, R&D, human resource development, etc. Although some steps have been initiated, several new steps need to be taken up for the successful adoption of EHR. It requires a coordinated effort from all the stakeholders.

  15. Benefits and drawbacks of electronic health record systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Menachemi N

    2011-05-01

    Full Text Available Nir Menachemi¹, Taleah H Collum²¹Department of Health Care Organization and Policy, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA; ²Department of Health Services Administration, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USAAbstract: The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH Act of 2009 that was signed into law as part of the "stimulus package" represents the largest US initiative to date that is designed to encourage widespread use of electronic health records (EHRs. In light of the changes anticipated from this policy initiative, the purpose of this paper is to review and summarize the literature on the benefits and drawbacks of EHR systems. Much of the literature has focused on key EHR functionalities, including clinical decision support systems, computerized order entry systems, and health information exchange. Our paper describes the potential benefits of EHRs that include clinical outcomes (eg, improved quality, reduced medical errors, organizational outcomes (eg, financial and operational benefits, and societal outcomes (eg, improved ability to conduct research, improved population health, reduced costs. Despite these benefits, studies in the literature highlight drawbacks associated with EHRs, which include the high upfront acquisition costs, ongoing maintenance costs, and disruptions to workflows that contribute to temporary losses in productivity that are the result of learning a new system. Moreover, EHRs are associated with potential perceived privacy concerns among patients, which are further addressed legislatively in the HITECH Act. Overall, experts and policymakers believe that significant benefits to patients and society can be realized when EHRs are widely adopted and used in a “meaningful” way.Keywords: EHR, health information technology, HITECH, computerized order entry, health information exchange 

  16. Attitudes and behaviors related to introduction of Electronic Health Record (EHR among Shiraz University students in 2014

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mohtaram Nematollahi

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available Introduction: Electronic Health Record contains all the information related to the health of citizens, from before birth to death have been consistently over time is electronically stored and will be available without regard to location or time all or part of it to authorized persons. The acceptance of EHR by citizens is important in successful implementation of it. The aim of this study was to determine the attitudes and behaviors related to the introduction of electronic health records among Shiraz university student. Method:The present study is a cross-sectional descriptive survey. The study population consisted of all Shiraz University students. The data gathering tool was a questionnaire and data were analyzed in SPSS v.16 software, using descriptive statistical tests. Also, the samples, i.e. 384 students, were selected through convenient sampling. Results: The results showed that most of the students kept their medical records at home to show them to a specialist and only 15% of them were familiar with the Electronic Health Records term. The use of Electronic Health Records for Maintenance of drug prescriptions was of the most importance. Conclusion: Among the students who are educated class and the source of change, the university students’ familiarity with Electronic Health Records is too low and most of them were not even familiar with its name and it is very important to implement this system familiarize the users on how to use it sufficiently

  17. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Q and A

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.

  18. Improving patient-centered communication while using an electronic health record: Report from a curriculum evaluation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fogarty, Colleen T; Winters, Paul; Farah, Subrina

    2016-05-01

    Researchers and clinicians are concerned about the impact of electronic health record use and patient-centered communication. Training about patient-centered clinical communication skills with the electronic health record may help clinicians adapt and remain patient-centered. We developed an interactive workshop eliciting challenges and opportunities of working with the electronic health record in clinical practice, introduction of specific patient-centered behaviors and mindful practice techniques, and video demonstrating contrasts in common behavior and "better practices." One hundred thirty-nine resident physicians and faculty supervisors in five residency training programs at the University of Rochester Medical Center participated in the workshops. Participants were asked to complete an 11-item survey of behaviors related to their use of the electronic health record prior to training and after attending training. We used paired t-tests to assess changes in self-reported behavior from pre-intervention to post-intervention. We trained 139 clinicians in the workshops; 110 participants completed the baseline assessment and 39 completed both the baseline and post-intervention assessment. Data from post-curriculum respondents found a statistically significant increase in "I told the patient when turning my attention from the patient to the computer," from 60% of the time prior to the training to 70% of the time after. Data from our program evaluation demonstrated improvement in one communication behavior. Sample size limited the detection of other changes; further research should investigate effective training techniques for patient-centered communication while using the electronic health record. © The Author(s) 2016.

  19. A novel system architecture for the national integration of electronic health records: a semi-centralized approach.

    Science.gov (United States)

    AlJarullah, Asma; El-Masri, Samir

    2013-08-01

    The goal of a national electronic health records integration system is to aggregate electronic health records concerning a particular patient at different healthcare providers' systems to provide a complete medical history of the patient. It holds the promise to address the two most crucial challenges to the healthcare systems: improving healthcare quality and controlling costs. Typical approaches for the national integration of electronic health records are a centralized architecture and a distributed architecture. This paper proposes a new approach for the national integration of electronic health records, the semi-centralized approach, an intermediate solution between the centralized architecture and the distributed architecture that has the benefits of both approaches. The semi-centralized approach is provided with a clearly defined architecture. The main data elements needed by the system are defined and the main system modules that are necessary to achieve an effective and efficient functionality of the system are designed. Best practices and essential requirements are central to the evolution of the proposed architecture. The proposed architecture will provide the basis for designing the simplest and the most effective systems to integrate electronic health records on a nation-wide basis that maintain integrity and consistency across locations, time and systems, and that meet the challenges of interoperability, security, privacy, maintainability, mobility, availability, scalability, and load balancing.

  20. A knowledge-based taxonomy of critical factors for adopting electronic health record systems by physicians: a systematic literature review

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Martínez-García Ana I

    2010-10-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background The health care sector is an area of social and economic interest in several countries; therefore, there have been lots of efforts in the use of electronic health records. Nevertheless, there is evidence suggesting that these systems have not been adopted as it was expected, and although there are some proposals to support their adoption, the proposed support is not by means of information and communication technology which can provide automatic tools of support. The aim of this study is to identify the critical adoption factors for electronic health records by physicians and to use them as a guide to support their adoption process automatically. Methods This paper presents, based on the PRISMA statement, a systematic literature review in electronic databases with adoption studies of electronic health records published in English. Software applications that manage and process the data in the electronic health record have been considered, i.e.: computerized physician prescription, electronic medical records, and electronic capture of clinical data. Our review was conducted with the purpose of obtaining a taxonomy of the physicians main barriers for adopting electronic health records, that can be addressed by means of information and communication technology; in particular with the information technology roles of the knowledge management processes. Which take us to the question that we want to address in this work: "What are the critical adoption factors of electronic health records that can be supported by information and communication technology?". Reports from eight databases covering electronic health records adoption studies in the medical domain, in particular those focused on physicians, were analyzed. Results The review identifies two main issues: 1 a knowledge-based classification of critical factors for adopting electronic health records by physicians; and 2 the definition of a base for the design of a conceptual

  1. A knowledge-based taxonomy of critical factors for adopting electronic health record systems by physicians: a systematic literature review.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Castillo, Víctor H; Martínez-García, Ana I; Pulido, J R G

    2010-10-15

    The health care sector is an area of social and economic interest in several countries; therefore, there have been lots of efforts in the use of electronic health records. Nevertheless, there is evidence suggesting that these systems have not been adopted as it was expected, and although there are some proposals to support their adoption, the proposed support is not by means of information and communication technology which can provide automatic tools of support. The aim of this study is to identify the critical adoption factors for electronic health records by physicians and to use them as a guide to support their adoption process automatically. This paper presents, based on the PRISMA statement, a systematic literature review in electronic databases with adoption studies of electronic health records published in English. Software applications that manage and process the data in the electronic health record have been considered, i.e.: computerized physician prescription, electronic medical records, and electronic capture of clinical data. Our review was conducted with the purpose of obtaining a taxonomy of the physicians main barriers for adopting electronic health records, that can be addressed by means of information and communication technology; in particular with the information technology roles of the knowledge management processes. Which take us to the question that we want to address in this work: "What are the critical adoption factors of electronic health records that can be supported by information and communication technology?". Reports from eight databases covering electronic health records adoption studies in the medical domain, in particular those focused on physicians, were analyzed. The review identifies two main issues: 1) a knowledge-based classification of critical factors for adopting electronic health records by physicians; and 2) the definition of a base for the design of a conceptual framework for supporting the design of knowledge

  2. Open source cardiology electronic health record development for DIGICARDIAC implementation

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dugarte, Nelson; Medina, Rubén.; Huiracocha, Lourdes; Rojas, Rubén.

    2015-12-01

    This article presents the development of a Cardiology Electronic Health Record (CEHR) system. Software consists of a structured algorithm designed under Health Level-7 (HL7) international standards. Novelty of the system is the integration of high resolution ECG (HRECG) signal acquisition and processing tools, patient information management tools and telecardiology tools. Acquisition tools are for management and control of the DIGICARDIAC electrocardiograph functions. Processing tools allow management of HRECG signal analysis searching for indicative patterns of cardiovascular pathologies. Telecardiology tools incorporation allows system communication with other health care centers decreasing access time to the patient information. CEHR system was completely developed using open source software. Preliminary results of process validation showed the system efficiency.

  3. Defining malaria burden from morbidity and mortality records, self ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Abstract: Malaria morbidity and mortality data from clinical records provide essential information .... Babati District is one of the eight sentinel sites in Tanzania for monitoring anti- ... treatment given before leaving the health facility was documented. ..... Targett, G. (1999) Vaccine efficacy, and immunity affecting transmission.

  4. Utilizing Health Records to Characterize Obesity, Comorbidities, and Health-Care Services in One Human Service Agency in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fisher, Kathleen; Hardie, Thomas L.; Ranjan, Sobhana; Peterson, Justin

    2017-01-01

    US surveys report higher prevalence of obesity in adults with intellectual disability. Health records of 40 adults with intellectual disability were retrospectively reviewed for data on health status, problem lists with International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision codes, medication lists, and health encounters over 18 months. Mean age…

  5. Health Records and the Cloud Computing Paradigm from a Privacy Perspective

    OpenAIRE

    Stingl, Christian; Slamanig, Daniel

    2011-01-01

    With the advent of cloud computing, the realization of highly available electronic health records providing location-independent access seems to be very promising. However, cloud computing raises major security issues that need to be addressed particularly within the health care domain. The protection of the privacy of individuals often seems to be left on the sidelines. For instance, common protection against malicious insiders, i.e., non-disclosure agreements, is purely organizational. Clea...

  6. Commentary: Lost in translation? How electronic health records structure communication, relationships, and meaning.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lown, Beth A; Rodriguez, Dayron

    2012-04-01

    The media through which we communicate shape how we think, how we act, and who we are. Electronic health records (EHRs) may promote more effective, efficient, coordinated, safer care. Research is emerging, but more is needed to assess the effect of EHRs on communication, relationships, patients' trust, adherence, and health outcomes. The authors posit that EHRs introduce a "third party" into exam room interactions that competes with the patient for clinicians' attention, affects clinicians' capacity to be fully present, and alters the nature of communication, relationships, and physicians' sense of professional role. Screen-driven communication inhibits patients' narratives and diminishes clinicians' responses to patients' cues about psychosocial issues and emotional concerns. Students, trainees, and clinicians can, however, learn to integrate EHRs into triadic exam room interactions to facilitate information sharing and shared decision making.Student exposure to EHRs is currently limited. Educators and researchers should implement curricula and assessment tools to help learners integrate EHRs into clinical interactions in ways that foster, rather than diminish, communication and relationships. Further, educators must prioritize the teaching and modeling of self-awareness and self-calibration, mindful presence, and compassion within such curricula to prevent these important qualities and skills from being lost in translation in the digital era.

  7. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Part 1

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2008-06-23

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.  Created: 6/23/2008 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service, Coordinating Center for Health Promotion, Healthcare Setting Goal Team.   Date Released: 7/29/2008.

  8. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Part 2

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2008-06-23

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.  Created: 6/23/2008 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service, Coordinating Center for Health Promotion, Healthcare Setting Goal Team.   Date Released: 7/29/2008.

  9. The SMART Platform: early experience enabling substitutable applications for electronic health records

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mandel, Joshua C; Murphy, Shawn N; Bernstam, Elmer Victor; Ramoni, Rachel L; Kreda, David A; McCoy, J Michael; Adida, Ben; Kohane, Isaac S

    2012-01-01

    Objective The Substitutable Medical Applications, Reusable Technologies (SMART) Platforms project seeks to develop a health information technology platform with substitutable applications (apps) constructed around core services. The authors believe this is a promising approach to driving down healthcare costs, supporting standards evolution, accommodating differences in care workflow, fostering competition in the market, and accelerating innovation. Materials and methods The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, through the Strategic Health IT Advanced Research Projects (SHARP) Program, funds the project. The SMART team has focused on enabling the property of substitutability through an app programming interface leveraging web standards, presenting predictable data payloads, and abstracting away many details of enterprise health information technology systems. Containers—health information technology systems, such as electronic health records (EHR), personally controlled health records, and health information exchanges that use the SMART app programming interface or a portion of it—marshal data sources and present data simply, reliably, and consistently to apps. Results The SMART team has completed the first phase of the project (a) defining an app programming interface, (b) developing containers, and (c) producing a set of charter apps that showcase the system capabilities. A focal point of this phase was the SMART Apps Challenge, publicized by the White House, using http://www.challenge.gov website, and generating 15 app submissions with diverse functionality. Conclusion Key strategic decisions must be made about the most effective market for further disseminating SMART: existing market-leading EHR vendors, new entrants into the EHR market, or other stakeholders such as health information exchanges. PMID:22427539

  10. Documentation of delirium in the VA electronic health record

    OpenAIRE

    Hope, Carol; Estrada, Nicollete; Weir, Charlene; Teng, Chia-Chen; Damal, Kavitha; Sauer, Brian C

    2014-01-01

    Background Delirium is a life-threatening, clinical syndrome common among the elderly and hospitalized patients. Delirium is under-recognized and misdiagnosed, complicating efforts to study the epidemiology and construct appropriate decision support to improve patient care. This study was primarily conducted to realize how providers documented confirmed cases of delirium in electronic health records as a preliminary step for using computerized methods to identify patients with delirium from e...

  11. Multimedia Health Records: user-centered design approach for a multimedia uploading service.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Plazzotta, Fernando; Mayan, John C; Storani, Fernando D; Ortiz, Juan M; Lopez, Gastón E; Gimenez, Gastón M; Luna, Daniel R

    2015-01-01

    Multimedia elements add value to text documents by transmitting information difficult to express in words. In healthcare, many professional and services keep this elements in their own repositories. This brings the problem of information fragmentation in different silos which hinder its access to other healthcare professionals. On the other hand patients have clinical data of their own in different formats generated in different healthcare organizations which is not accessible to professionals within our healthcare network. This paper describes the design, development and implementation processes of a service which allows media elements to be loaded in a patient clinical data repository (CDR) either through an electronic health record by professionals (EHR) or through a personal health record (PHR) by patients, in order to avoid fragmentation of the information.

  12. Integrated Personal Health Records: Transformative Tools for Consumer-Centric Care

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Raymond Brian

    2008-10-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Integrated personal health records (PHRs offer significant potential to stimulate transformational changes in health care delivery and self-care by patients. In 2006, an invitational roundtable sponsored by Kaiser Permanente Institute, the American Medical Informatics Association, and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality was held to identify the transformative potential of PHRs, as well as barriers to realizing this potential and a framework for action to move them closer to the health care mainstream. This paper highlights and builds on the insights shared during the roundtable. Discussion While there is a spectrum of dominant PHR models, (standalone, tethered, integrated, the authors state that only the integrated model has true transformative potential to strengthen consumers' ability to manage their own health care. Integrated PHRs improve the quality, completeness, depth, and accessibility of health information provided by patients; enable facile communication between patients and providers; provide access to health knowledge for patients; ensure portability of medical records and other personal health information; and incorporate auto-population of content. Numerous factors impede widespread adoption of integrated PHRs: obstacles in the health care system/culture; issues of consumer confidence and trust; lack of technical standards for interoperability; lack of HIT infrastructure; the digital divide; uncertain value realization/ROI; and uncertain market demand. Recent efforts have led to progress on standards for integrated PHRs, and government agencies and private companies are offering different models to consumers, but substantial obstacles remain to be addressed. Immediate steps to advance integrated PHRs should include sharing existing knowledge and expanding knowledge about them, building on existing efforts, and continuing dialogue among public and private sector stakeholders. Summary Integrated PHRs

  13. Technical Limitations of Electronic Health Records in Community Health Centers: Implications on Ambulatory Care Quality

    Science.gov (United States)

    West, Christopher E.

    2010-01-01

    Research objectives: This dissertation examines the state of development of each of the eight core electronic health record (EHR) functionalities as described by the IOM and describes how the current state of these functionalities limit quality improvement efforts in ambulatory care settings. There is a great deal of literature describing both the…

  14. Using ISO 25040 standard for evaluating electronic health record systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Oliveira, Marília; Novaes, Magdala; Vasconcelos, Alexandre

    2013-01-01

    Quality of electronic health record systems (EHR-S) is one of the key points in the discussion about the safe use of this kind of system. It stimulates creation of technical standards and certifications in order to establish the minimum requirements expected for these systems. [1] In other side, EHR-S suppliers need to invest in evaluation of their products to provide systems according to these requirements. This work presents a proposal of use ISO 25040 standard, which focuses on the evaluation of software products, for define a model of evaluation of EHR-S in relation to Brazilian Certification for Electronic Health Record Systems - SBIS-CFM Certification. Proposal instantiates the process described in ISO 25040 standard using the set of requirements that is scope of the Brazilian certification. As first results, this research has produced an evaluation model and a scale for classify an EHR-S about its compliance level in relation to certification. This work in progress is part for the acquisition of the degree of master in Computer Science at the Federal University of Pernambuco.

  15. Use of large electronic health record databases for environmental epidemiology studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Background: Electronic health records (EHRs) are a ubiquitous component of the United States healthcare system and capture nearly all data collected in a clinic or hospital setting. EHR databases are attractive for secondary data analysis as they may contain detailed clinical rec...

  16. The provision and impact of online patient access to their electronic health records (EHR) and transactional services on the quality and safety of health care: systematic review protocol.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mold, Freda; Ellis, Beverley; de Lusignan, Simon; Sheikh, Aziz; Wyatt, Jeremy C; Cavill, Mary; Michalakidis, Georgios; Barker, Fiona; Majeed, Azeem; Quinn, Tom; Koczan, Phil; Avanitis, Theo; Gronlund, Toto Anne; Franco, Christina; McCarthy, Mary; Renton, Zoë; Chauhan, Umesh; Blakey, Hannah; Kataria, Neha; Jones, Simon; Rafi, Imran

    2012-01-01

    Innovators have piloted improvements in communication, changed patterns of practice and patient empowerment from online access to electronic health records (EHR). International studies of online services, such as prescription ordering, online appointment booking and secure communications with primary care, show good uptake of email consultations, accessing test results and booking appointments; when technologies and business process are in place. Online access and transactional services are due to be rolled out across England by 2015; this review seeks to explore the impact of online access to health records and other online services on the quality and safety of primary health care. To assess the factors that may affect the provision of online patient access to their EHR and transactional services, and the impact of such access on the quality and safety of health care. Two reviewers independently searched 11 international databases during the period 1999-2012. A range of papers including descriptive studies using qualitative or quantitative methods, hypothesis-testing studies and systematic reviews were included. A detailed eligibility criterion will be used to shape study inclusion. A team of experts will review these papers for eligibility, extract data using a customised extraction form and use the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) instrument to determine the quality of the evidence and the strengths of any recommendation. Data will then be descriptively summarised and thematically synthesised. Where feasible, we will perform a quantitative meta-analysis. Prospero (International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews) registration number: crd42012003091.

  17. A Study of Personal Health Record User's Behavioral Model Based on the PMT and UTAUT Integrative Perspective.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hsieh, Hui-Lung; Kuo, Yu-Ming; Wang, Shiang-Ru; Chuang, Bi-Kun; Tsai, Chung-Hung

    2016-12-23

    The personal health record (PHR) is a system that enables borderless medical care services by combining technological innovation and human consideration. This study explored factors affecting the adoption of PHR from technical, medical, and social perspectives according to the Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) and Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model. A survey using a structured questionnaire was subsequently conducted, which produced the following results: (1) The PMT and UTAUT were effective at predicting PHR usage behaviors; (2) Perceived ease-of-use was the most decisive factor influencing the use of PHR, followed by self-efficacy and perceived usefulness; and (3) Behavioral intention for PHR was significantly and positively correlated with usage behavior. From the obtained results, this study recommends that health authorities and medical institutions promote self-efficacy in the use of PHR to improve the levels of behavioral intention and usage behavior among the people. Additionally, medical care institutions are recommended to promote health management and preventive healthcare concepts to help improve public acceptance of the PHR system as a means to self-manage their health. Finally, community centers, medical institutions, and health authorities are urged to work together to enhance public medical knowledge and pool resources for the PHR system, both of which are essential for improving the popularity of the PHR, public quality of life, and the effectiveness of health management.

  18. Terminological Shadows: a Framework to Integrate Electronic Health Records with Clinical Terminologies

    OpenAIRE

    Yu, Sheng

    2014-01-01

    Healthcare processes across the world have migrated from an approach where healthcare is provided in generalist centres of care to one where the patient is referred between specialists who engage in shared care. The developers of recent Electronic Health Record (EHR) standards such as CEN EN13606 and HL7 version 3 aim to enable healthcare professionals in a shared care setting to deliver high quality health data and share patient health information. A key innovation of these standards is a p...

  19. The value of personal health records for chronic disease management: what do we know?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tenforde, Mark; Jain, Anil; Hickner, John

    2011-05-01

    Electronic personal health records (PHRs) allow patients access to their medical records, self-management tools, and new avenues of communication with their health care providers. They will likely become a valuable component of the primary care Patient-centered Medical Home model. Primary care physicians, who manage the majority of chronic disease, will use PHRs to help patients manage their diabetes and other chronic diseases requiring continuity of care and enhanced information flow between patient and physician. In this brief report, we explore the evidence for the value of PHRs in chronic disease management. We used a comprehensive review of MEDLINE articles published in English between January 2000 and September 2010 on personal health records and related search terms. Few published articles have described PHR programs designed for use in chronic disease management or PHR adoption and attitudes in the context of chronic disease management. Only three prospective randomized trials have evaluated the benefit of PHR use in chronic disease management, all in diabetes care. These trials showed small improvements in some but not all diabetes care measures. All three trials involved additional interventions, making it difficult to determine the influence of patient PHR use in improved outcomes. The evidence remains sparse to support the value of PHR use for chronic disease management. With the current policy focus on meaningful use of electronic and personal health records, it is crucial to investigate and learn from new PHR products so as to maximize the clinical value of this tool.

  20. Predictive modeling of structured electronic health records for adverse drug event detection.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhao, Jing; Henriksson, Aron; Asker, Lars; Boström, Henrik

    2015-01-01

    The digitization of healthcare data, resulting from the increasingly widespread adoption of electronic health records, has greatly facilitated its analysis by computational methods and thereby enabled large-scale secondary use thereof. This can be exploited to support public health activities such as pharmacovigilance, wherein the safety of drugs is monitored to inform regulatory decisions about sustained use. To that end, electronic health records have emerged as a potentially valuable data source, providing access to longitudinal observations of patient treatment and drug use. A nascent line of research concerns predictive modeling of healthcare data for the automatic detection of adverse drug events, which presents its own set of challenges: it is not yet clear how to represent the heterogeneous data types in a manner conducive to learning high-performing machine learning models. Datasets from an electronic health record database are used for learning predictive models with the purpose of detecting adverse drug events. The use and representation of two data types, as well as their combination, are studied: clinical codes, describing prescribed drugs and assigned diagnoses, and measurements. Feature selection is conducted on the various types of data to reduce dimensionality and sparsity, while allowing for an in-depth feature analysis of the usefulness of each data type and representation. Within each data type, combining multiple representations yields better predictive performance compared to using any single representation. The use of clinical codes for adverse drug event detection significantly outperforms the use of measurements; however, there is no significant difference over datasets between using only clinical codes and their combination with measurements. For certain adverse drug events, the combination does, however, outperform using only clinical codes. Feature selection leads to increased predictive performance for both data types, in isolation and

  1. The Effects of Daily Co-Occurrence of Affect on Older Adults’ Reactivity to Health Stressors

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ramsey, Jennifer L.; Neupert, Shevaun D.; Mroczek, Daniel K.; Spiro, Avron

    2015-01-01

    Objectives The present study examined age differences among older adults in the daily co-occurrence of affect and its potential role in buffering the negative effects of health stressors. Design Participants were from the Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study (NAS) and included 249 young-old adults (age = 60–79 years, M=71.6) and 64 old-old adults (age = 80–89, M = 82.9) who completed questionnaires assessing stressors, physical health symptoms, and positive and negative affect on eight consecutive days. Results An independent samples t-test showed young-old and old-old adults did not significantly differ in their mean levels of daily co-occurrence of affect. The between-person relationships among stressors, health, and daily co-occurrence of affect revealed that neither stressors nor health were significantly related to daily co-occurrence of affect. However, results from a multilevel model revealed a three-way cross-level interaction (Health Stressor X Age Group X Co-Occurrence of Affect) where old-old adults with higher levels of co-occurrence of affect were less emotionally reactive to health stressors than young-old adults. Conclusion These findings provide support for the assertion that co-occurrence of affect functions in an adaptive capacity and highlight the importance of examining domain specific stressors. PMID:26518259

  2. The effects of daily co-occurrence of affect on older adults' reactivity to health stressors.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ramsey, Jennifer L; Neupert, Shevaun D; Mroczek, Daniel K; Spiro, Avron

    2016-01-01

    The present study examined age differences among older adults in the daily co-occurrence of affect and its potential role in buffering the negative effects of health stressors. Participants were from the Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study and included 249 young-old adults (age = 60-79 years, M = 71.6) and 64 old-old adults (age = 80-89, M = 82.9) who completed questionnaires assessing stressors, physical health symptoms, and positive and negative affect for eight consecutive days. An independent samples t-test showed young-old and old-old adults did not significantly differ in their mean levels of daily co-occurrence of affect. The between-person relationships among stressors, health and daily co-occurrence of affect revealed that neither stressors nor health were significantly related to daily co-occurrence of affect. However, results from a multilevel model revealed a three-way cross-level interaction (health stressor × age group × co-occurrence of affect) where old-old adults with higher levels of co-occurrence of affect were less emotionally reactive to health stressors than young-old adults. These findings provide support for the assertion that co-occurrence of affect functions in an adaptive capacity and highlight the importance of examining domain-specific stressors.

  3. Accounting and Co-constructing: The Development of a Standard for Electronic Health Records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bossen, Claus

    2011-01-01

    care services, cooperation between staff and make patient records immediately and accessible to distributed actors. Investments also have the aims of making health care services more accountable, integrated and increase quality and efficiency. This paper analyses a Danish national standard...... for electronic health records on the basis of an application prototype test build on that standard. The analysis shows that inscribed in the standard is an ambition to make staff and health care services more accountable at the cost of more work, loss of overview and fragmentation of patient cases. Significantly......, despite the standard having been conceived and developed in a process of co-construction with clinicians, clinicians did not find it adequate for their work. The analysis argues this was the result of the model of work embedded in the standard coming from a stance from without practice. Subsequently...

  4. Consumer Adoption of Personal Health Record Systems: A Self-Determination Theory Perspective.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Assadi, Vahid; Hassanein, Khaled

    2017-07-27

    Personal Health Records (PHR) systems provide individuals with access and control over their health information and consequently can support individuals in becoming active participants, rather than passive recipients, in their own care process. In spite of numerous benefits suggested for consumers' utilizing PHR systems, research has shown that such systems are not yet widely adopted or well known to consumers. Bearing in mind the potential benefits of PHRs to consumers and their potential interest in these systems-and that similar to any other type of information system, adoption is a prerequisite for realizing the potential benefits of PHR systems-research is needed to understand how to enhance the adoption rates for PHR systems. This research seeks to understand how individuals' intentions to adopt PHR systems are affected by their self-determination in managing their own health-the extent of their ability to take an active role in managing their own health. As such, this research aims to develop and empirically validate a theoretical model that explains PHR systems adoption by the general public through the integration of theories from the information systems and psychology literatures. This research employs a cross-sectional survey method targeted at the Canadian general public without any prior experience in using PHR systems. A partial least squares approach to structural equation modeling was used to validate the proposed research model of this study (N=159). Individuals with higher levels of ability to manage their own health (self-determination) are more likely to adopt PHR systems since they have more positive perceptions regarding the use of such systems. Further, such self-determination is fueled by autonomy support from consumers' physicians as well as the consumers' personality trait of autonomy orientation. This study advances our theoretical understanding of PHR systems adoption. It also contributes to practice by providing insightful implications

  5. The Impact of Health Literacy on a Patient's Decision to Adopt a Personal Health Record

    Science.gov (United States)

    Noblin, Alice M.; Wan, Thomas T. H.; Fottler, Myron

    2012-01-01

    Health literacy is a concept that describes a patient's ability to understand materials provided by physicians or other providers. Several factors, including education level, income, and age, can influence health literacy. Research conducted at one medical practice in Florida indicated that in spite of the patients’ relatively low education level, the majority indicated a broad acceptance of personal health record (PHR) technology. The key variable explaining patient willingness to adopt a PHR was the patient's health literacy as measured by the eHealth Literacy Scale (eHEALS). Adoption and use rates may also depend on the availability of office staff for hands-on training as well as assistance with interpretation of medical information. It is hoped that technology barriers will disappear over time, and usefulness of the information will promote increased utilization of PHRs. Patient understanding of the information remains a challenge that must be overcome to realize the full potential of PHRs. PMID:23209454

  6. A comparison of death recording by health centres and civil registration in South Africans receiving antiretroviral treatment.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Johnson, Leigh F; Dorrington, Rob E; Laubscher, Ria; Hoffmann, Christopher J; Wood, Robin; Fox, Matthew P; Cornell, Morna; Schomaker, Michael; Prozesky, Hans; Tanser, Frank; Davies, Mary-Ann; Boulle, Andrew

    2015-01-01

    There is uncertainty regarding the completeness of death recording by civil registration and by health centres in South Africa. This paper aims to compare death recording by the two systems, in cohorts of South African patients receiving antiretroviral treatment (ART). Completeness of death recording was estimated using a capture-recapture approach. Six ART programmes linked their patient record systems to the vital registration system using civil identity document (ID) numbers and provided data comparing the outcomes recorded in patient files and in the vital registration. Patients were excluded if they had missing/invalid IDs or had transferred to other ART programmes. After exclusions, 91,548 patient records were included. Of deaths recorded in patients files after 2003, 94.0% (95% CI: 93.3-94.6%) were recorded by civil registration, with completeness being significantly higher in urban areas, older adults and females. Of deaths recorded by civil registration after 2003, only 35.0% (95% CI: 34.2-35.8%) were recorded in patient files, with this proportion dropping from 60% in 2004-2005 to 30% in 2010 and subsequent years. Recording of deaths in patient files was significantly higher in children and in locations within 50 km of the health centre. When the information from the two systems was combined, an estimated 96.2% of all deaths were recorded (93.5% in children and 96.2% in adults). South Africa's civil registration system has achieved a high level of completeness in the recording of mortality. However, the fraction of deaths recorded by health centres is low and information from patient records is insufficient by itself to evaluate levels and predictors of ART patient mortality. Previously documented improvements in ART mortality over time may be biased if based only on data from patient records.

  7. Choosing a physician depends on how you want to feel: the role of ideal affect in health-related decision making.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sims, Tamara; Tsai, Jeanne L; Koopmann-Holm, Birgit; Thomas, Ewart A C; Goldstein, Mary K

    2014-02-01

    When given a choice, how do people decide which physician to select? Although significant research has demonstrated that how people actually feel (their "actual affect") influences their health care preferences, how people ideally want to feel (their "ideal affect") may play an even greater role. Specifically, we predicted that people trust physicians whose affective characteristics match their ideal affect, which leads people to prefer those physicians more. Consistent with this prediction, the more participants wanted to feel high arousal positive states on average (ideal HAP; e.g., excited), the more likely they were to select a HAP-focused physician. Similarly, the more people wanted to feel low arousal positive states on average (ideal LAP; e.g., calm), the more likely they were to select a LAP-focused physician. Also as predicted, these links were mediated by perceived physician trustworthiness. Notably, while participants' ideal affect predicted physician preference, actual affect (how much people actually felt HAP and LAP on average) did not. These findings suggest that people base serious decisions on how they want to feel, and highlight the importance of considering ideal affect in models of decision making preferences. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved.

  8. An Architecture for Semantically Interoperable Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Toffanello, André; Gonçalves, Ricardo; Kitajima, Adriana; Puttini, Ricardo; Aguiar, Atualpa

    2017-01-01

    Despite the increasing adhesion of electronic health records, the challenge of semantic interoperability remains unsolved. The fact that different parties can exchange messages does not mean they can understand the underlying clinical meaning, therefore, it cannot be assumed or treated as a requirement. This work introduces an architecture designed to achieve semantic interoperability, in a way which organizations that follow different policies may still share medical information through a common infrastructure comparable to an ecosystem, whose organisms are exemplified within the Brazilian scenario. Nonetheless, the proposed approach describes a service-oriented design with modules adaptable to different contexts. We also discuss the establishment of an enterprise service bus to mediate a health infrastructure defined on top of international standards, such as openEHR and IHE. Moreover, we argue that, in order to achieve truly semantic interoperability in a wide sense, a proper profile must be published and maintained.

  9. The value of personal health record (PHR) systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kaelber, David; Pan, Eric C

    2008-11-06

    Personal health records (PHRs) are a rapidly growing area of health information technology despite a lack of significant value-based assessment.Here we present an assessment of the potential value of PHR systems, looking at both costs and benefits.We examine provider-tethered, payer-tethered, and third-party PHRs, as well as idealized interoperable PHRs. An analytical model was developed that considered eight PHR application and infrastructure functions. Our analysis projects the initial and annual costs and annual benefits of PHRs to the entire US over the next 10 years.This PHR analysis shows that all forms of PHRs have initial net negative value. However, at the end of 10 years, steady state annual net value ranging from$13 billion to -$29 billion. Interoperable PHRs provide the most value, followed by third-party PHRs and payer-tethered PHRs also showing positive net value. Provider-tethered PHRs constantly demonstrating negative net value.

  10. Point-of-care cluster randomized trial in stroke secondary prevention using electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dregan, Alex; van Staa, Tjeerd P; McDermott, Lisa; McCann, Gerard; Ashworth, Mark; Charlton, Judith; Wolfe, Charles D A; Rudd, Anthony; Yardley, Lucy; Gulliford, Martin C; Trial Steering Committee

    2014-07-01

    The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the remote introduction of electronic decision support tools into family practices improves risk factor control after first stroke. This study also aimed to develop methods to implement cluster randomized trials in stroke using electronic health records. Family practices were recruited from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink and allocated to intervention and control trial arms by minimization. Remotely installed, electronic decision support tools promoted intensified secondary prevention for 12 months with last measure of systolic blood pressure as the primary outcome. Outcome data from electronic health records were analyzed using marginal models. There were 106 Clinical Practice Research Datalink family practices allocated (intervention, 53; control, 53), with 11 391 (control, 5516; intervention, 5875) participants with acute stroke ever diagnosed. Participants at trial practices had similar characteristics as 47,887 patients with stroke at nontrial practices. During the intervention period, blood pressure values were recorded in the electronic health records for 90% and cholesterol values for 84% of participants. After intervention, the latest mean systolic blood pressure was 131.7 (SD, 16.8) mm Hg in the control trial arm and 131.4 (16.7) mm Hg in the intervention trial arm, and adjusted mean difference was -0.56 mm Hg (95% confidence interval, -1.38 to 0.26; P=0.183). The financial cost of the trial was approximately US $22 per participant, or US $2400 per family practice allocated. Large pragmatic intervention studies may be implemented at low cost by using electronic health records. The intervention used in this trial was not found to be effective, and further research is needed to develop more effective intervention strategies. http://www.controlled-trials.com. Current Controlled Trials identifier: ISRCTN35701810. © 2014 American Heart Association, Inc.

  11. Design and implementation of a privacy preserving electronic health record linkage tool in Chicago.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kho, Abel N; Cashy, John P; Jackson, Kathryn L; Pah, Adam R; Goel, Satyender; Boehnke, Jörn; Humphries, John Eric; Kominers, Scott Duke; Hota, Bala N; Sims, Shannon A; Malin, Bradley A; French, Dustin D; Walunas, Theresa L; Meltzer, David O; Kaleba, Erin O; Jones, Roderick C; Galanter, William L

    2015-09-01

    To design and implement a tool that creates a secure, privacy preserving linkage of electronic health record (EHR) data across multiple sites in a large metropolitan area in the United States (Chicago, IL), for use in clinical research. The authors developed and distributed a software application that performs standardized data cleaning, preprocessing, and hashing of patient identifiers to remove all protected health information. The application creates seeded hash code combinations of patient identifiers using a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act compliant SHA-512 algorithm that minimizes re-identification risk. The authors subsequently linked individual records using a central honest broker with an algorithm that assigns weights to hash combinations in order to generate high specificity matches. The software application successfully linked and de-duplicated 7 million records across 6 institutions, resulting in a cohort of 5 million unique records. Using a manually reconciled set of 11 292 patients as a gold standard, the software achieved a sensitivity of 96% and a specificity of 100%, with a majority of the missed matches accounted for by patients with both a missing social security number and last name change. Using 3 disease examples, it is demonstrated that the software can reduce duplication of patient records across sites by as much as 28%. Software that standardizes the assignment of a unique seeded hash identifier merged through an agreed upon third-party honest broker can enable large-scale secure linkage of EHR data for epidemiologic and public health research. The software algorithm can improve future epidemiologic research by providing more comprehensive data given that patients may make use of multiple healthcare systems. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

  12. The Department of Energy`s Rocky Flats Plant: A guide to record series useful for health-related research. Volume VII. Employee occupational exposure and health

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1995-08-01

    This is the seventh in a series of seven volumes which constitute a guide to records of the Rocky Flats Plant useful for conducting health-related research. The primary purpose of Volume VII is to describe record series pertaining to employee occupational exposure and health at the Department of Energy`s (DOE) Rocky Flats Plant, now named the Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site, near Denver, Colorado. History Associates Incorporated (HAI) prepared this guide as part of its work as the support services contractor for DOE`s Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project. This introduction briefly describes the Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project and HAI`s role in the project, provides a history of occupational exposure monitoring and health practices at Rocky Flats, and identifies organizations contributing to occupational exposure monitoring and health policies and activities. Other topics include the scope and arrangement of the guide and the organization to contact for access to these records. Comprehensive introductory and background information is available in Volume 1. Other volumes in the guide pertain to administrative and general subjects, facilities and equipment, production and materials handling, environmental and workplace monitoring, and waste management. In addition, HAI has produced a subject-specific guide, titled The September 1957 Rocky Flats Fire: A Guide to Record Series of the Department of Energy and Its Contractors, which researchers should consult for further information about records related to this incident.

  13. Feeling old today? Daily health, stressors, and affect explain day-to-day variability in subjective age.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kotter-Grühn, Dana; Neupert, Shevaun D; Stephan, Yannick

    2015-01-01

    Subjective age is an important correlate of health, well-being, and longevity. So far, little is known about short-term variability in subjective age and the circumstances under which individuals feel younger/older in daily life. This study examined whether (a) older adults' felt age fluctuates on a day-to-day basis, (b) daily changes in health, stressors, and affect explain fluctuations in felt age, and (c) the daily associations between felt age and health, stressors, or affect are time-ordered. Using an eight-day daily diary approach, N = 43 adults (60-96 years, M = 74.65, SD = 8.19) filled out daily questionnaires assessing subjective age, health, daily stressors, and affect. Data were analysed using multilevel modelling. Subjective age, health, daily stressors, affect. Intra-individual variability in felt age was not explained by time but by short-term variability in other variables. Specifically, on days when participants experienced more than average health problems, stress, or negative affect they felt older than on days with average health, stress, or negative affect. No time-ordered effects were found. Bad health, many stressors, and negative affective experiences constitute circumstances under which older adults feel older than they typically do. Thus, daily measures of subjective age could be markers of health and well-being.

  14. The Cradle Coast Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record evaluation research plan

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Cummings, Elizabeth; Cheek, Colleen; Van Der Ploeg, Winifred

    2012-01-01

    In 2010 the Federal Government announced funding over two years to create a Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR) for Australians. One of the wave 2 implementation sites is the Cradle Coast in Tasmania. A PCEHR Program Benefits and Evaluation Partner (BEP) has been appointed to u...

  15.   Representations at Work: A national Standard for Electronic Health Records

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bossen, Claus

    2006-01-01

      Representations are at work in IT technology. As plans of and for work, they enable cooperation, coordination, accountability and control, which have to be balanced off against each other. The article describes a standard developed for electronic health records (EHR) and the results of a test...

  16. Ethical issues in electronic health records: A general overview

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fouzia F Ozair

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Electronic health record (EHR is increasingly being implemented in many developing countries. It is the need of the hour because it improves the quality of health care and is also cost-effective. Technologies can introduce some hazards hence safety of information in the system is a real challenge. Recent news of security breaches has put a question mark on this system. Despite its increased usefulness, and increasing enthusiasm in its adoption, not much attention is being paid to the ethical issues that might arise. Securing EHR with an encrypted password is a probable option. The purpose of this article is to discuss the various ethical issues arising in the use of the EHRs and their possible solutions.

  17. The Effect of Electronic Health Record Use and Patient-Centered Communication on Cancer Screening Behavior: An Analysis of the Health Information National Trends Survey.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Totzkay, Daniel; Silk, Kami J; Sheff, Sarah E

    2017-07-01

    The present study used the 2013 Health Information National Trends Survey (N = 3185) to examine the effects of patient-centered communication (PCC) and the use of electronic health records (EHRs) on the likelihood of patients receiving a recommended screening for cancer (i.e., mammogram, PSA test). Self-determination theory, a framework of self-initiated extrinsic behaviors, was applied to test mediation models of PCC and EHR use, respectively, through patient activation. The results demonstrated that PCC and EHR use predicted cancer screening (mediated through patient activation), but only for women recommended for biannual mammograms. The aforementioned relationship was not found for men who are recommended for prostate cancer screening. PCC and EHRs do appear to facilitate a patient's ability to take care of their own health, but only under certain circumstances. It was additionally found that men were more likely to report higher degrees of physician PCC when their physicians maintained an EHR, whereas women reported no difference. Future research should examine more nuanced personality factors that affect the perception of PCC in the presence of EHRs and the relationship between men's activation and likelihood of receiving a cancer screen.

  18. Learning a Health Knowledge Graph from Electronic Medical Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rotmensch, Maya; Halpern, Yoni; Tlimat, Abdulhakim; Horng, Steven; Sontag, David

    2017-07-20

    Demand for clinical decision support systems in medicine and self-diagnostic symptom checkers has substantially increased in recent years. Existing platforms rely on knowledge bases manually compiled through a labor-intensive process or automatically derived using simple pairwise statistics. This study explored an automated process to learn high quality knowledge bases linking diseases and symptoms directly from electronic medical records. Medical concepts were extracted from 273,174 de-identified patient records and maximum likelihood estimation of three probabilistic models was used to automatically construct knowledge graphs: logistic regression, naive Bayes classifier and a Bayesian network using noisy OR gates. A graph of disease-symptom relationships was elicited from the learned parameters and the constructed knowledge graphs were evaluated and validated, with permission, against Google's manually-constructed knowledge graph and against expert physician opinions. Our study shows that direct and automated construction of high quality health knowledge graphs from medical records using rudimentary concept extraction is feasible. The noisy OR model produces a high quality knowledge graph reaching precision of 0.85 for a recall of 0.6 in the clinical evaluation. Noisy OR significantly outperforms all tested models across evaluation frameworks (p < 0.01).

  19. Towards the Adoption of Open Source and Open Access Electronic Health Record Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ilias Maglogiannis

    2012-01-01

    Full Text Available As the Electronic Health Record (EHR systems constantly expand to support more clinical activities and their implementations in healthcare organizations become more widespread, several communities have been working intensively for several years to develop open access and open source EHR software, aiming at reducing the costs of EHR deployment and maintenance. In this paper, we describe and evaluate the most popular open source electronic medical records such as openEMR, openMRS and patientOS, providing their technical features and potentials. These systems are considered quite important due to their prevalence. The article presents the key features of each system and outlines the advantages and problems of Open Source Software (OSS Systems through a review of the literature, in order to demonstrate the possibility of their adoption in modern electronic healthcare systems. Also discussed are the future trends of OS EHRs in the context of the Personal Health Records and mobile computing paradigm.

  20. Health care quality measures for children and adolescents in Foster Care: feasibility testing in electronic records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Deans, Katherine J; Minneci, Peter C; Nacion, Kristine M; Leonhart, Karen; Cooper, Jennifer N; Scholle, Sarah Hudson; Kelleher, Kelly J

    2018-02-22

    Preventive quality measures for the foster care population are largely untested. The objective of the study is to identify healthcare quality measures for young children and adolescents in foster care and to test whether the data required to calculate these measures can be feasibly extracted and interpreted within an electronic health records or within the Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System. The AAP Recommendations for Preventive Pediatric Health Care served as the guideline for determining quality measures. Quality measures related to well child visits, developmental screenings, immunizations, trauma-related care, BMI measurements, sexually transmitted infections and depression were defined. Retrospective chart reviews were performed on a cohort of children in foster care from a single large pediatric institution and related county. Data available in the Ohio Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System was compared to the same population studied in the electronic health record review. Quality measures were calculated as observed (received) to expected (recommended) ratios (O/E ratios) to describe the actual quantity of recommended health care that was received by individual children. Electronic health records and the Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System data frequently lacked important information on foster care youth essential for calculating the measures. Although electronic health records were rich in encounter specific clinical data, they often lacked custodial information such as the dates of entry into and exit from foster care. In contrast, Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System included robust data on custodial arrangements, but lacked detailed medical information. Despite these limitations, several quality measures were devised that attempted to accommodate these limitations. In this feasibility testing, neither the electronic health records at a single institution nor the county level Statewide

  1. Nursing Student Experiences Regarding Safe Use of Electronic Health Records: A Pilot Study of the Safety and Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience Guides.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Whitt, Karen J; Eden, Lacey; Merrill, Katreena Collette; Hughes, Mckenna

    2017-01-01

    Previous research has linked improper electronic health record configuration and use with adverse patient events. In response to this problem, the US Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology developed the Safety and Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience guides to evaluate electronic health records for optimal use and safety features. During the course of their education, nursing students are exposed to a variety of clinical practice settings and electronic health records. This descriptive study evaluated 108 undergraduate and 51 graduate nursing students' ratings of electronic health record features and safe practices, as well as what they learned from utilizing the computerized provider order entry and clinician communication Safety and Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience guide checklists. More than 80% of the undergraduate and 70% of the graduate students reported that they experienced user problems with electronic health records in the past. More than 50% of the students felt that electronic health records contribute to adverse patient outcomes. Students reported that many of the features assessed were not fully implemented in their electronic health record. These findings highlight areas where electronic health records can be improved to optimize patient safety. The majority of students reported that utilizing the Safety and Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience guides increased their understanding of electronic health record features.

  2. Relationship between parent held child records for immunisations, parental recall and health service.

    LENUS (Irish Health Repository)

    Jessop, L

    2011-03-01

    Parent held child records (PHCR) were introduced in Ireland in 2008. This study investigated the relationship between the PHCR, parental recall and regional Health Service Executive (HSE) records for immunisation uptake. It used the Lifeways cohort study of 1070 singleton children to compare immunisation data from PHCR at one year, parental recall at five years and information from the HSE. When compared to HSE records, full recording of primary immunisations in the PHCR was reported for 695 of 749 (92.8%) children. Parental recall was correct for 520 of 538 (96.7%) children. Of the 307 completed PHCRs, 207 (75.9%) agreed with the HSE records. Agreement between the three sources for primary immunisations was 74-93% but was not statistically significant. Agreement was 91% (p < 0.001) for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccines between parental recall and HSE records. PHCRs underestimated and parental recall overestimated immunisation status when compared with HSE records.

  3. Accuracy of Laboratory Data Communication on ICU Daily Rounds Using an Electronic Health Record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Artis, Kathryn A; Dyer, Edward; Mohan, Vishnu; Gold, Jeffrey A

    2017-02-01

    Accurately communicating patient data during daily ICU rounds is critically important since data provide the basis for clinical decision making. Despite its importance, high fidelity data communication during interprofessional ICU rounds is assumed, yet unproven. We created a robust but simple methodology to measure the prevalence of inaccurately communicated (misrepresented) data and to characterize data communication failures by type. We also assessed how commonly the rounding team detected data misrepresentation and whether data communication was impacted by environmental, human, and workflow factors. Direct observation of verbalized laboratory data during daily ICU rounds compared with data within the electronic health record and on presenters' paper prerounding notes. Twenty-six-bed academic medical ICU with a well-established electronic health record. ICU rounds presenter (medical student or resident physician), interprofessional rounding team. None. During 301 observed patient presentations including 4,945 audited laboratory results, presenters used a paper prerounding tool for 94.3% of presentations but tools contained only 78% of available electronic health record laboratory data. Ninty-six percent of patient presentations included at least one laboratory misrepresentation (mean, 6.3 per patient) and 38.9% of all audited laboratory data were inaccurately communicated. Most misrepresentation events were omissions. Only 7.8% of all laboratory misrepresentations were detected. Despite a structured interprofessional rounding script and a well-established electronic health record, clinician laboratory data retrieval and communication during ICU rounds at our institution was poor, prone to omissions and inaccuracies, yet largely unrecognized by the rounding team. This highlights an important patient safety issue that is likely widely prevalent, yet underrecognized.

  4. Measuring up: Implementing a dental quality measure in the electronic health record context.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bhardwaj, Aarti; Ramoni, Rachel; Kalenderian, Elsbeth; Neumann, Ana; Hebballi, Nutan B; White, Joel M; McClellan, Lyle; Walji, Muhammad F

    2016-01-01

    Quality improvement requires using quality measures that can be implemented in a valid manner. Using guidelines set forth by the Meaningful Use portion of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act, the authors assessed the feasibility and performance of an automated electronic Meaningful Use dental clinical quality measure to determine the percentage of children who received fluoride varnish. The authors defined how to implement the automated measure queries in a dental electronic health record. Within records identified through automated query, the authors manually reviewed a subsample to assess the performance of the query. The automated query results revealed that 71.0% of patients had fluoride varnish compared with the manual chart review results that indicated 77.6% of patients had fluoride varnish. The automated quality measure performance results indicated 90.5% sensitivity, 90.8% specificity, 96.9% positive predictive value, and 75.2% negative predictive value. The authors' findings support the feasibility of using automated dental quality measure queries in the context of sufficient structured data. Information noted only in free text rather than in structured data would require using natural language processing approaches to effectively query electronic health records. To participate in self-directed quality improvement, dental clinicians must embrace the accountability era. Commitment to quality will require enhanced documentation to support near-term automated calculation of quality measures. Copyright © 2016 American Dental Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  5. Electronic health records: what does your signature signify?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Victoroff MD Michael S

    2012-08-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Electronic health records serve multiple purposes, including clinical communication, legal documentation, financial transaction capture, research and analytics. Electronic signatures attached to entries in EHRs have different logical and legal meanings for different users. Some of these are vestiges from historic paper formats that require reconsideration. Traditionally accepted functions of signatures, such as identity verification, attestation, consent, authorization and non-repudiation can become ambiguous in the context of computer-assisted workflow processes that incorporate functions like logins, auto-fill and audit trails. This article exposes the incompatibility of expectations among typical users of electronically signed information.

  6. Health Reform in Minnesota: An Analysis of Complementary Initiatives Implementing Electronic Health Record Technology and Care Coordination.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Soderberg, Karen; Rajamani, Sripriya; Wholey, Douglas; LaVenture, Martin

    2016-01-01

    Minnesota enacted legislation in 2007 that requires all health care providers in the state to implement an interoperable electronic health record (EHR) system by 2015. 100% of hospitals and 98% of clinics had adopted EHR systems by end of 2015. Minnesota's 2008 health reform included a health care home (HCH) program, Minnesota's patient centered medical home. By end of 2014, 43% of HCH eligible clinics were certified with 335 certified HCHs and 430 eligible but not certified clinics. To study the association between adoption and use of EHRs in primary care clinics and HCH certification, including use of clinical decision support tools, patient registries, electronic exchange of patient information, and availability of patient portals. Study utilized data from the 2015 Minnesota Health Information Technology Clinic Survey conducted annually by the Minnesota Department of Health. The response rate was 80% with 1,181 of 1,473 Minnesota clinics, including 662 HCH eligible primary care clinics. The comparative analysis focused on certified HCHs (311) and eligible but not certified clinics (351). HCH clinics utilized the various tools of EHR technology at a higher rate than non-HCH clinics. This greater utilization was noted across a range of functionalities: clinical decision support, patient disease registries, EHR to support quality improvement, electronic exchange of summary care records and availability of patient portals. HCH certification was significant for clinical decision support tools, registries and quality improvement. HCH requirements of care management, care coordination and quality improvement can be better supported with EHR technology, which underscores the higher rate of utilization of EHR tools by HCH clinics. Optimizing electronic exchange of health information remains a challenge for all clinics, including HCH certified clinics. This research presents the synergy between complementary initiatives supporting EHR adoption and HCH certification

  7. Personal health records: Consumer attitudes toward privacy and security of their personal health information.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lafky, Deborah Beranek; Horan, Thomas A

    2011-03-01

    Personal health record (PHR) systems are a subject of intense interest in the move to improve healthcare accessibility and quality. Although a number of vendors continue to put forward PHR systems, user-centered design research has lagged, and it has not been clear what features are important to prospective PHR users. Here, we report on a user-centered design study that combines qualitative and quantitative approaches to investigate several dimensions relevant to PHR design, and to look at the effect of health status on user needs. The results indicate that health status, especially disability and chronic illness, is relevant to PHR design. Further, the results provide empirical evidence about the role of privacy and security in users' attitudes toward PHR use. The exact nature of these attitudes differs from widely held perceptions about consumer values in healthcare information management. © The Author(s) 2011.

  8. Health protection at the Savannah River Site: A guide to records series of the Department of Energy and its contractors

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1996-09-01

    As part of the Department of Energy`s (DOE) Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project, History Associates Incorporated (HAI) prepared this guide to the records series pertaining to health protection activities at the DOE`s Savannah River Site (SRS). Since its inception in the early 1950s, the SRS, formerly known as the Savannah River Plant (SRP), has demonstrated significant interest in safeguarding facilities, protecting employees` health, and monitoring the environment. The guide describes records that concern health protection program administration, radiological monitoring of the plant and the environment, calibration and maintenance of monitoring instruments, internal and external dosimetry practices, medical surveillance of employees, occupational safety and training measures, site visitation, and electronic information systems. The introduction to the guide describes the Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project and HAI`s role in the project. It provides brief histories of the DOE, SRS, and the SRS organizational units responsible for health protection activities. This introduction also summarizes HAI`s methodology in developing criteria and conducting its verification of the SRS inventory of active and inactive SRS Health Protection records. Furthermore, it furnishes information on the production of the guide, the content of the records series descriptions, the location of the records, and the procedures for accessing records repositories.

  9. Health protection at the Savannah River Site: A guide to records series of the Department of Energy and its contractors

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1996-09-01

    As part of the Department of Energy's (DOE) Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project, History Associates Incorporated (HAI) prepared this guide to the records series pertaining to health protection activities at the DOE's Savannah River Site (SRS). Since its inception in the early 1950s, the SRS, formerly known as the Savannah River Plant (SRP), has demonstrated significant interest in safeguarding facilities, protecting employees' health, and monitoring the environment. The guide describes records that concern health protection program administration, radiological monitoring of the plant and the environment, calibration and maintenance of monitoring instruments, internal and external dosimetry practices, medical surveillance of employees, occupational safety and training measures, site visitation, and electronic information systems. The introduction to the guide describes the Epidemiologic Records Inventory Project and HAI's role in the project. It provides brief histories of the DOE, SRS, and the SRS organizational units responsible for health protection activities. This introduction also summarizes HAI's methodology in developing criteria and conducting its verification of the SRS inventory of active and inactive SRS Health Protection records. Furthermore, it furnishes information on the production of the guide, the content of the records series descriptions, the location of the records, and the procedures for accessing records repositories

  10. Structuring and coding in health care records: a qualitative analysis using diabetes as a case study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Robertson, Ann R R; Fernando, Bernard; Morrison, Zoe; Kalra, Dipak; Sheikh, Aziz

    2015-03-27

    Globally, diabetes mellitus presents a substantial and increasing burden to individuals, health care systems and society. Structuring and coding of information in the electronic health record underpin attempts to improve sharing and searching for information. Digital records for those with long-term conditions are expected to bring direct and secondary uses benefits, and potentially to support patient self-management. We sought to investigate if how and why records for adults with diabetes were structured and coded and to explore a range of UK stakeholders' perceptions of current practice in the National Health Service. We carried out a qualitative, theoretically informed case study of documenting health care information for diabetes in family practice and hospital settings in England, using semi-structured interviews, observations, systems demonstrations and documentary data. We conducted 22 interviews and four on-site observations. With respect to secondary uses - research, audit, public health and service planning - interviewees clearly articulated the benefits of highly structured and coded diabetes data and it was believed that benefits would expand through linkage to other datasets. Direct, more marginal, clinical benefits in terms of managing and monitoring diabetes and perhaps encouraging patient self-management were also reported. We observed marked differences in levels of record structuring and/or coding between family practices, where it was high, and the hospital. We found little evidence that structured and coded data were being exploited to improve information sharing between care settings. Using high levels of data structuring and coding in records for diabetes patients has the potential to be exploited more fully, and lessons might be learned from successful developments elsewhere in the UK. A first step would be for hospitals to attain levels of health information technology infrastructure and systems use commensurate with family practices.

  11. Radiology Reporting System Data Exchange With the Electronic Health Record System: A Case Study in Iran.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ahmadi, Maryam; Ghazisaeidi, Marjan; Bashiri, Azadeh

    2015-03-18

    In order to better designing of electronic health record system in Iran, integration of health information systems based on a common language must be done to interpret and exchange this information with this system is required. This study provides a conceptual model of radiology reporting system using unified modeling language. The proposed model can solve the problem of integration this information system with the electronic health record system. By using this model and design its service based, easily connect to electronic health record in Iran and facilitate transfer radiology report data. This is a cross-sectional study that was conducted in 2013. The study population was 22 experts that working at the Imaging Center in Imam Khomeini Hospital in Tehran and the sample was accorded with the community. Research tool was a questionnaire that prepared by the researcher to determine the information requirements. Content validity and test-retest method was used to measure validity and reliability of questioner respectively. Data analyzed with average index, using SPSS. Also Visual Paradigm software was used to design a conceptual model. Based on the requirements assessment of experts and related texts, administrative, demographic and clinical data and radiological examination results and if the anesthesia procedure performed, anesthesia data suggested as minimum data set for radiology report and based it class diagram designed. Also by identifying radiology reporting system process, use case was drawn. According to the application of radiology reports in electronic health record system for diagnosing and managing of clinical problem of the patient, with providing the conceptual Model for radiology reporting system; in order to systematically design it, the problem of data sharing between these systems and electronic health records system would eliminate.

  12. Electronic health record

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kierkegaard, Patrick

    2011-01-01

    The European Commission wants to boost the digital economy by enabling all Europeans to have access to online medical records anywhere in Europe by 2020. With the newly enacted Directive 2011/24/EU on Patients’ Rights in cross border healthcare due for implementation by 2013, it is inevitable tha...

  13. Focus on People: Rethinking the Power and Potential of Personal Health Records - Q and A

    Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

    2008-06-23

    Dr. Patricia Brennan discusses how Project HealthDesign is working to enhance the utility and flexibility of personal health records as a critical tool to help people take action to improve their health and improve the health care of all Americans.  Created: 6/23/2008 by Coordinating Center for Health Information Service, Coordinating Center for Health Promotion, Healthcare Setting Goal Team.   Date Released: 7/29/2008.

  14. What are the effects of introducing electronic health recording systems? A systematic review including a scoping review. Prospero. Registration number CRD42018084313

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Jansbøl, Ulf Kåre; Rohde, Jeanett Friis; Jensen, Pia-Lis

    2018-01-01

    Electronic health recording systems have been in use for more than 10 in some countries, regions and hospitals. More countries, regions and hospitals introduce and use electronic health recording systems. To our knowledge, it is unknown what research has been done on the clinical effects, patients...... satisfaction and health professionals satisfaction relating to electronic health recording systems. Furthermore, it is unknown if there exist sufficient research to do systematic reviews on clinical effects, patients satisfaction and health professionals satisfaction relating to electronic health recording...... systems. Furthermore, it is unknown, what the result of the research shows. Such knowledge is important since it points out what research needs to be done. Furthermore, it informs decision making on using or not using electronic health recording systems. Finally, it is important to know how satisfied...

  15. Electronic Health Record in Bolivia and ICT: A Perspective for Latin America

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eugenio Gil

    2017-08-01

    Full Text Available The emergence of new technologies in society through its application to many areas and very diverse realities is a clear element in the time in which we live. The health sector has been unable to escape this reality and has been renovated many of its traditional structures with new options brought by the application of information technology and communication (ICT in areas such as management and hospital administration. This paper focuses on analyzing from the point of view of medical diagnosis the importance of electronic medical records as a unifying element of the information essential for this type of diagnosis, and the use of artificial intelligence techniques in this field. To this end the current situation of electronic medical records is analyzed in a country like Bolivia exhaustively analyzing three of the most important health centers. Is used for this unstructured interview experts on the subject reflect the current status of electronic medical records from the point of view of protection of the right to privacy of individuals and will serve as a model for development, not only in Bolivia but also in other Latin American countries.

  16. Personal health records in the preclinical medical curriculum: modeling student responses in a simple educational environment utilizing Google Health

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karamanlis Dimokratis A

    2012-09-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Various problems concerning the introduction of personal health records in everyday healthcare practice are reported to be associated with physicians’ unfamiliarity with systematic means of electronically collecting health information about their patients (e.g. electronic health records - EHRs. Such barriers may further prevent the role physicians have in their patient encounters and the influence they can have in accelerating and diffusing personal health records (PHRs to the patient community. One way to address these problems is through medical education on PHRs in the context of EHR activities within the undergraduate medical curriculum and the medical informatics courses in specific. In this paper, the development of an educational PHR activity based on Google Health is reported. Moreover, student responses on PHR’s use and utility are collected and presented. The collected responses are then modelled to relate the satisfaction level of students in such a setting to the estimation about their attitude towards PHRs in the future. Methods The study was conducted by designing an educational scenario about PHRs, which consisted of student instruction on Google Health as a model PHR and followed the guidelines of a protocol that was constructed for this purpose. This scenario was applied to a sample of 338 first-year undergraduate medical students. A questionnaire was distributed to each one of them in order to obtain Likert-like scale data on the sample’s response with respect to the PHR that was used; the data were then further analysed descriptively and in terms of a regression analysis to model hypothesised correlations. Results Students displayed, in general, satisfaction about the core PHR functions they used and they were optimistic about using them in the future, as they evaluated quite high up the level of their utility. The aspect they valued most in the PHR was its main role as a record-keeping tool, while

  17. Patient-Centered e-Health Record over the Cloud.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Koumaditis, Konstantinos; Themistocleous, Marinos; Vassilacopoulos, George; Prentza, Andrianna; Kyriazis, Dimosthenis; Malamateniou, Flora; Maglaveras, Nicos; Chouvarda, Ioanna; Mourouzis, Alexandros

    2014-01-01

    The purpose of this paper is to introduce the Patient-Centered e-Health (PCEH) conceptual aspects alongside a multidisciplinary project that combines state-of-the-art technologies like cloud computing. The project, by combining several aspects of PCEH, such as: (a) electronic Personal Healthcare Record (e-PHR), (b) homecare telemedicine technologies, (c) e-prescribing, e-referral, e-learning, with advanced technologies like cloud computing and Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), will lead to an innovative integrated e-health platform of many benefits to the society, the economy, the industry, and the research community. To achieve this, a consortium of experts, both from industry (two companies, one hospital and one healthcare organization) and academia (three universities), was set to investigate, analyse, design, build and test the new platform. This paper provides insights to the PCEH concept and to the current stage of the project. In doing so, we aim at increasing the awareness of this important endeavor and sharing the lessons learned so far throughout our work.

  18. Hospital Electronic Health Record Adoption and Its Influence on Postoperative Sepsis

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fareed, Naleef

    2013-01-01

    Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems could make healthcare delivery safer by providing benefits such as timely access to accurate and complete patient information, advances in diagnosis and coordination of care, and enhancements for monitoring patient vitals. This study explored the nature of EHR adoption in U.S. hospitals and their patient…

  19. Factors Affecting Sexual History Taking in a Health Center Serving Homeless Persons.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sowicz, Timothy Joseph; Bradway, Christine K

    2018-03-01

    Low rates of documentation of sexual histories have been reported and research on sexual history taking (SHT) has focused on the content of, barriers to collecting, and interventions to improve documentation of sexual histories. Absent from this literature is an understanding of the contextual factors affecting SHT. To address this gap, a focused ethnography of one health center was conducted. Data were collected through observations of health care encounters and interviews with health care providers (HCPs). No SHT was observed and this was likely influenced by patients' characteristics, communication between patients and HCPs, the prioritization of patients' basic needs, and time constraints imposed upon encounters. Given that the health center studied serves patients experiencing homelessness, behavioral health concerns, and opioid use disorder, findings illuminate areas for future inquiry into a patient population affected by social as well as physiologic determinants of health and potentially at high risk for adverse sexual health outcomes.

  20. An effective approach for choosing an electronic health record.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rowley, Robert

    2009-01-01

    With government stimulus money becoming available to encourage healthcare facilities to adopt electronic health record (EHR) systems, the decision to move forward with implementing an EHR system has taken on an urgency not previously seen. The EHR landscape is evolving rapidly and the underlying technology platform is becoming increasingly interconnected. One must make sure that an EHR decision does not lock oneself into technology obsolescence. The best approach for evaluating an EHR is on the basis of:usability, interoperability, and affordability.

  1. The provision and impact of online patient access to their electronic health records (EHR and transactional services on the quality and safety of health care: systematic review protocol

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Freda Mold

    2013-09-01

    Full Text Available Background Innovators have piloted improvements in communication, changed patterns of practice and patient empowerment from online access to electronic health records (EHR. International studies of online services, such as prescription ordering, online appointment booking and secure communications with primary care, show good uptake of email consultations, accessing test results and booking appointments; when technologies and business process are in place. Online access and transactional services are due to be rolled out across England by 2015; this review seeks to explore the impact of online access to health records and other online services on the quality and safety of primary health care.Objective To assess the factors that may affect the provision of online patient access to their EHR and transactional services, and the impact of such access on the quality and safety of health care.Method Two reviewers independently searched 11 international databases during the period 1999–2012. A range of papers including descriptive studies using qualitative or quantitative methods, hypothesis-testing studies and systematic reviews were included. A detailed eligibility criterion will be used to shape study inclusion .A team of experts will review these papers for eligibility, extract data using a customised extraction form and use the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE instrument to determine the quality of the evidence and the strengths of any recommendation. Data will then be descriptively summarised and thematically synthesised. Where feasible, we will perform a quantitative meta-analysis.Prospero (International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews registration number: crd42012003091.

  2. Integration services to enable regional shared electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Oliveira, Ilídio C; Cunha, João P S

    2011-01-01

    eHealth is expected to integrate a comprehensive set of patient data sources into a coherent continuum, but implementations vary and Portugal is still lacking on electronic patient data sharing. In this work, we present a clinical information hub to aggregate multi-institution patient data and bridge the information silos. This integration platform enables a coherent object model, services-oriented applications development and a trust framework. It has been instantiated in the Rede Telemática de Saúde (www.RTSaude.org) to support a regional Electronic Health Record approach, fed dynamically from production systems at eight partner institutions, providing access to more than 11,000,000 care episodes, relating to over 350,000 citizens. The network has obtained the necessary clearance from the Portuguese data protection agency.

  3. 75 FR 50987 - Privacy Act System of Records; National Animal Health Laboratory Network (NAHLN)

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-08-18

    ...The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) proposes to add a new Privacy Act system of records to its inventory of records systems subject to the Privacy Act of 1974, as amended, and invites public comment on this new records system. The system of records being proposed is the National Animal Health Laboratory Network. This notice is necessary to meet the requirements of the Privacy Act to publish in the Federal Register notice of the existence and character of record systems maintained by the agency. Although the Privacy Act requires only that the portion of the system that describes ``routine uses'' of the system be published for comment, USDA invites comment on all portions of this notice.

  4. A Study of Personal Health Record User’s Behavioral Model Based on the PMT and UTAUT Integrative Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hui-Lung Hsieh

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available The personal health record (PHR is a system that enables borderless medical care services by combining technological innovation and human consideration. This study explored factors affecting the adoption of PHR from technical, medical, and social perspectives according to the Protection Motivation Theory (PMT and Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT model. A survey using a structured questionnaire was subsequently conducted, which produced the following results: (1 The PMT and UTAUT were effective at predicting PHR usage behaviors; (2 Perceived ease-of-use was the most decisive factor influencing the use of PHR, followed by self-efficacy and perceived usefulness; and (3 Behavioral intention for PHR was significantly and positively correlated with usage behavior. From the obtained results, this study recommends that health authorities and medical institutions promote self-efficacy in the use of PHR to improve the levels of behavioral intention and usage behavior among the people. Additionally, medical care institutions are recommended to promote health management and preventive healthcare concepts to help improve public acceptance of the PHR system as a means to self-manage their health. Finally, community centers, medical institutions, and health authorities are urged to work together to enhance public medical knowledge and pool resources for the PHR system, both of which are essential for improving the popularity of the PHR, public quality of life, and the effectiveness of health management.

  5. A Study of Personal Health Record User’s Behavioral Model Based on the PMT and UTAUT Integrative Perspective

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hsieh, Hui-Lung; Kuo, Yu-Ming; Wang, Shiang-Ru; Chuang, Bi-Kun; Tsai, Chung-Hung

    2016-01-01

    The personal health record (PHR) is a system that enables borderless medical care services by combining technological innovation and human consideration. This study explored factors affecting the adoption of PHR from technical, medical, and social perspectives according to the Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) and Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model. A survey using a structured questionnaire was subsequently conducted, which produced the following results: (1) The PMT and UTAUT were effective at predicting PHR usage behaviors; (2) Perceived ease-of-use was the most decisive factor influencing the use of PHR, followed by self-efficacy and perceived usefulness; and (3) Behavioral intention for PHR was significantly and positively correlated with usage behavior. From the obtained results, this study recommends that health authorities and medical institutions promote self-efficacy in the use of PHR to improve the levels of behavioral intention and usage behavior among the people. Additionally, medical care institutions are recommended to promote health management and preventive healthcare concepts to help improve public acceptance of the PHR system as a means to self-manage their health. Finally, community centers, medical institutions, and health authorities are urged to work together to enhance public medical knowledge and pool resources for the PHR system, both of which are essential for improving the popularity of the PHR, public quality of life, and the effectiveness of health management. PMID:28025557

  6. Leveraging electronic health records for clinical research.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Raman, Sudha R; Curtis, Lesley H; Temple, Robert; Andersson, Tomas; Ezekowitz, Justin; Ford, Ian; James, Stefan; Marsolo, Keith; Mirhaji, Parsa; Rocca, Mitra; Rothman, Russell L; Sethuraman, Barathi; Stockbridge, Norman; Terry, Sharon; Wasserman, Scott M; Peterson, Eric D; Hernandez, Adrian F

    2018-04-30

    Electronic health records (EHRs) can be a major tool in the quest to decrease costs and timelines of clinical trial research, generate better evidence for clinical decision making, and advance health care. Over the past decade, EHRs have increasingly offered opportunities to speed up, streamline, and enhance clinical research. EHRs offer a wide range of possible uses in clinical trials, including assisting with prestudy feasibility assessment, patient recruitment, and data capture in care delivery. To fully appreciate these opportunities, health care stakeholders must come together to face critical challenges in leveraging EHR data, including data quality/completeness, information security, stakeholder engagement, and increasing the scale of research infrastructure and related governance. Leaders from academia, government, industry, and professional societies representing patient, provider, researcher, industry, and regulator perspectives convened the Leveraging EHR for Clinical Research Now! Think Tank in Washington, DC (February 18-19, 2016), to identify barriers to using EHRs in clinical research and to generate potential solutions. Think tank members identified a broad range of issues surrounding the use of EHRs in research and proposed a variety of solutions. Recognizing the challenges, the participants identified the urgent need to look more deeply at previous efforts to use these data, share lessons learned, and develop a multidisciplinary agenda for best practices for using EHRs in clinical research. We report the proceedings from this think tank meeting in the following paper. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier, Inc. All rights reserved.

  7. A tutorial on activity-based costing of electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Federowicz, Marie H; Grossman, Mila N; Hayes, Bryant J; Riggs, Joseph

    2010-01-01

    As the American Recovery and Restoration Act of 2009 allocates $19 billion to health information technology, it will be useful for health care managers to project the true cost of implementing an electronic health record (EHR). This study presents a step-by-step guide for using activity-based costing (ABC) to estimate the cost of an EHR. ABC is a cost accounting method with a "top-down" approach for estimating the cost of a project or service within an organization. The total cost to implement an EHR includes obvious costs, such as licensing fees, and hidden costs, such as impact on productivity. Unlike other methods, ABC includes all of the organization's expenditures and is less likely to miss hidden costs. Although ABC is used considerably in manufacturing and other industries, it is a relatively new phenomenon in health care. ABC is a comprehensive approach that the health care field can use to analyze the cost-effectiveness of implementing EHRs. In this article, ABC is applied to a health clinic that recently implemented an EHR, and the clinic is found to be more productive after EHR implementation. This methodology can help health care administrators assess the impact of a stimulus investment on organizational performance.

  8. The value of structured data elements from electronic health records for identifying subjects for primary care clinical trials.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ateya, Mohammad B; Delaney, Brendan C; Speedie, Stuart M

    2016-01-11

    An increasing number of clinical trials are conducted in primary care settings. Making better use of existing data in the electronic health records to identify eligible subjects can improve efficiency of such studies. Our study aims to quantify the proportion of eligibility criteria that can be addressed with data in electronic health records and to compare the content of eligibility criteria in primary care with previous work. Eligibility criteria were extracted from primary care studies downloaded from the UK Clinical Research Network Study Portfolio. Criteria were broken into elemental statements. Two expert independent raters classified each statement based on whether or not structured data items in the electronic health record can be used to determine if the statement was true for a specific patient. Disagreements in classification were discussed until 100 % agreement was reached. Statements were also classified based on content and the percentages of each category were compared to two similar studies reported in the literature. Eligibility criteria were retrieved from 228 studies and decomposed into 2619 criteria elemental statements. 74 % of the criteria elemental statements were considered likely associated with structured data in an electronic health record. 79 % of the studies had at least 60 % of their criteria statements addressable with structured data likely to be present in an electronic health record. Based on clinical content, most frequent categories were: "disease, symptom, and sign", "therapy or surgery", and "medication" (36 %, 13 %, and 10 % of total criteria statements respectively). We also identified new criteria categories related to provider and caregiver attributes (2.6 % and 1 % of total criteria statements respectively). Electronic health records readily contain much of the data needed to assess patients' eligibility for clinical trials enrollment. Eligibility criteria content categories identified by our study can be

  9. Importance-Performance Analysis of Personal Health Records in Taiwan: A Web-Based Survey

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rau, Hsiao-Hsien; Chen, Kang-Hua

    2017-01-01

    Background Empowering personal health records (PHRs) provides basic human right, awareness, and intention for health promotion. As health care delivery changes toward patient-centered services, PHRs become an indispensable platform for consumers and providers. Recently, the government introduced “My health bank,” a Web-based electronic medical records (EMRs) repository for consumers. However, it is not yet a PHR. To date, we do not have a platform that can let patients manage their own PHR. Objective This study creates a vision of a value-added platform for personal health data analysis and manages their health record based on the contents of the "My health bank." This study aimed to examine consumer expectation regarding PHR, using the importance-performance analysis. The purpose of this study was to explore consumer perception regarding this type of a platform: it would try to identify the key success factors and important aspects by using the importance-performance analysis, and give some suggestions for future development based on it. Methods This is a cross-sectional study conducted in Taiwan. Web-based invitation to participate in this study was distributed through Facebook. Respondents were asked to watch an introductory movie regarding PHR before filling in the questionnaire. The questionnaire was focused on 2 aspects, including (1) system functions, and (2) system design and security and privacy. The questionnaire would employ 12 and 7 questions respectively. The questionnaire was designed following 5-points Likert scale ranging from 1 (“disagree strongly”) to 5 (“Agree strongly”). Afterwards, the questionnaire data was sorted using IBM SPSS Statistics 21 for descriptive statistics and the importance-performance analysis. Results This research received 350 valid questionnaires. Most respondents were female (219 of 350 participants, 62.6%), 21-30 years old (238 of 350 participants, 68.0%), with a university degree (228 of 350 participants, 65

  10. Empirical advances with text mining of electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Delespierre, T; Denormandie, P; Bar-Hen, A; Josseran, L

    2017-08-22

    Korian is a private group specializing in medical accommodations for elderly and dependent people. A professional data warehouse (DWH) established in 2010 hosts all of the residents' data. Inside this information system (IS), clinical narratives (CNs) were used only by medical staff as a residents' care linking tool. The objective of this study was to show that, through qualitative and quantitative textual analysis of a relatively small physiotherapy and well-defined CN sample, it was possible to build a physiotherapy corpus and, through this process, generate a new body of knowledge by adding relevant information to describe the residents' care and lives. Meaningful words were extracted through Standard Query Language (SQL) with the LIKE function and wildcards to perform pattern matching, followed by text mining and a word cloud using R® packages. Another step involved principal components and multiple correspondence analyses, plus clustering on the same residents' sample as well as on other health data using a health model measuring the residents' care level needs. By combining these techniques, physiotherapy treatments could be characterized by a list of constructed keywords, and the residents' health characteristics were built. Feeding defects or health outlier groups could be detected, physiotherapy residents' data and their health data were matched, and differences in health situations showed qualitative and quantitative differences in physiotherapy narratives. This textual experiment using a textual process in two stages showed that text mining and data mining techniques provide convenient tools to improve residents' health and quality of care by adding new, simple, useable data to the electronic health record (EHR). When used with a normalized physiotherapy problem list, text mining through information extraction (IE), named entity recognition (NER) and data mining (DM) can provide a real advantage to describe health care, adding new medical material and

  11. Prevalence of food allergies and intolerances documented in electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Acker, Warren W; Plasek, Joseph M; Blumenthal, Kimberly G; Lai, Kenneth H; Topaz, Maxim; Seger, Diane L; Goss, Foster R; Slight, Sarah P; Bates, David W; Zhou, Li

    2017-12-01

    Food allergy prevalence is reported to be increasing, but epidemiological data using patients' electronic health records (EHRs) remain sparse. We sought to determine the prevalence of food allergy and intolerance documented in the EHR allergy module. Using allergy data from a large health care organization's EHR between 2000 and 2013, we determined the prevalence of food allergy and intolerance by sex, racial/ethnic group, and allergen group. We examined the prevalence of reactions that were potentially IgE-mediated and anaphylactic. Data were validated using radioallergosorbent test and ImmunoCAP results, when available, for patients with reported peanut allergy. Among 2.7 million patients, we identified 97,482 patients (3.6%) with 1 or more food allergies or intolerances (mean, 1.4 ± 0.1). The prevalence of food allergy and intolerance was higher in females (4.2% vs 2.9%; P food allergen groups were shellfish (0.9%), fruit or vegetable (0.7%), dairy (0.5%), and peanut (0.5%). Of the 103,659 identified reactions to foods, 48.1% were potentially IgE-mediated (affecting 50.8% of food allergy or intolerance patients) and 15.9% were anaphylactic. About 20% of patients with reported peanut allergy had a radioallergosorbent test/ImmunoCAP performed, of which 57.3% had an IgE level of grade 3 or higher. Our findings are consistent with previously validated methods for studying food allergy, suggesting that the EHR's allergy module has the potential to be used for clinical and epidemiological research. The spectrum of severity observed with food allergy highlights the critical need for more allergy evaluations. Copyright © 2017 American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology. All rights reserved.

  12. Exploring the Relationships between the Electronic Health Record System Components and Patient Outcomes in an Acute Hospital Setting

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wiggley, Shirley L.

    2011-01-01

    Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the electronic health record system components and patient outcomes in an acute hospital setting, given that the current presidential administration has earmarked nearly $50 billion to the implementation of the electronic health record. The relationship between the…

  13. Attribute framing affects the perceived fairness of health care allocation principles

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eyal Gamliel

    2010-02-01

    Full Text Available Health care resource allocation is a central moral issue in health policy, and opinions about it have been studied extensively. Allocation situations have typically been described and presented in a positive manner (i.e., who should receive medical aid. On the other hand, the negative valence allocation situation (i.e., who should not receive medical aid has been relatively neglected. This paper demonstrates how positive versus negative framing of the exact same health care resource allocation situation can affect the perceived fairness of allocation principles. Participants usually perceived non-egalitarian principles (i.e., need, equity and tenure to be fairer in positively framed situations (i.e., to deliver health care resources to certain patients than negatively framed situation (i.e., not to deliver health care resources to other patients. However, framing did not affect the perceived fairness of the equality principle (i.e., a random draw. The paper offers a theoretical explanation for the effect of framing on the perceived fairness of heath care resource allocation and discusses implications for both researchers and policy makers.

  14. Impact of Electronic Health Records on Nurses' Information Seeking and Discriminating Skills for Critical Thinking

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jackson, Adria S.

    2013-01-01

    In February 2009, the United States government passed into law the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) providing incentive money for hospitals and care providers to implement a certified electronic health record (EHR) in order to promote the adoption and…

  15. Artifact reduction in maternal abdominal ECG recordings for fetal ECG estimation.

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Vullings, R.; Peters, C.H.L.; Mischi, M.; Sluijter, R.J.; Oei, S.G.; Bergmans, J.W.M.

    2010-01-01

    Monitoring the fetal electrocardiogram (1ECG) is currently one of the most promising methods to assess fetal health. However, the main problem associated with this method is that the signals recorded from the maternal abdomen are affected by noise and interferences: the maternal electrocardiogram

  16. Negative and positive affect are independently associated with patient-reported health status following percutaneous coronary intervention.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Versteeg, Henneke; Pedersen, Susanne S; Erdman, Ruud A M; van Nierop, Josephine W I; de Jaegere, Peter; van Domburg, Ron T

    2009-10-01

    We examined the association between negative and positive affect and 12-month health status in patients treated with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with drug-eluting stents. Consecutive PCI patients (n = 562) completed the Global Mood Scale at baseline to assess affect and the EuroQoL-5D (EQ-5D) at baseline and 12-month follow-up to assess health status. Negative affect [F(1, 522) = 17.14, P positive affect [F(1, 522) = 5.11, P = .02] at baseline were independent associates of overall health status at 12-month follow-up, adjusting for demographic and clinical factors. Moreover, there was a significant interaction for negative by positive affect [F(1, 522) = 6.11, P = .01]. In domain-specific analyses, high negative affect was associated with problems in mobility, self-care, usual activities, pain/discomfort, and anxiety/depression with the risk being two to fivefold. Low positive affect was only associated with problems in self-care (OR: 8.14; 95% CI: 1.85-35.9; P = .006) and usual activities (OR: 1.87; 95% CI: 1.17-3.00; P = .009). Baseline negative and positive affect contribute independently to patient-reported health status 12 months post PCI. Positive affect moderated the detrimental effects of negative affect on overall health status. Enhancing positive affect might be an important target to improve patient-centered outcomes in coronary artery disease.

  17. Moderating effects of voluntariness on the actual use of electronic health records for allied health professionals.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chiu, Teresa Ml; Ku, Benny Ps

    2015-02-10

    Mandatory versus voluntary requirement has moderating effect on a person's intention to use a new information technology. Studies have shown that the use of technology in health care settings is predicted by perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, social influence, facilitating conditions, and attitude towards computer. These factors have different effects on mandatory versus voluntary environment of use. However, the degree and direction of moderating effect of voluntariness on these factors remain inconclusive. This study aimed to examine the moderating effect of voluntariness on the actual use of an electronic health record (EHR) designed for use by allied health professionals in Hong Kong. Specifically, this study explored and compared the moderating effects of voluntariness on factors organized into technology, implementation, and individual contexts. Physiotherapists who had taken part in the implementation of a new EHR were invited to complete a survey. The survey included questions that measured the levels of voluntariness, technology acceptance and use, and attitude towards technology. Multiple logistic regressions were conducted to identify factors associated with actual use of a compulsory module and a noncompulsory module of the EHR. In total, there were 93 participants in the study. All of them had access to the noncompulsory module, the e-Progress Note, to record progress notes of their patients. Out of the 93 participants, 57 (62%) were required to use a compulsory module, the e-Registration, to register patient attendance. In the low voluntariness environment, Actual Use was associated with Effort Expectancy (mean score of users 3.51, SD 0.43; mean score of non-users 3.21, SD 0.31; P=.03). Effort Expectancy measured the perceived ease of use and was a variable in the technology context. The variables in the implementation and individual contexts did not show a difference between the two groups. In the high voluntariness environment, the mean

  18. Public Hospital Spending in England: Evidence from National Health Service Administrative Records

    OpenAIRE

    Kelly, E.; Stoye, G.; Vera-Hernández, M.

    2016-01-01

    © 2016 The Authors. Fiscal Studies published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. on behalf of Institute for Fiscal StudiesHealth spending per capita in England has almost doubled since 1997, yet relatively little is known about how that spending is distributed across the population. This paper uses administrative National Health Service (NHS) hospital records to examine key features of public hospital spending in England. We describe how costs vary across the life cycle, and the concentration of spendi...

  19. Public hospital spending in England: Evidence from National Health Service administrative records

    OpenAIRE

    Kelly, Elaine; Stoye, George; Vera-Hernández, Marcos

    2015-01-01

    Health spending per capita in England has more than doubled since 1997, yet relatively little is known about how that spending is distributed across the population. This paper uses administrative National Health Service (NHS) hospital records to examine key features of public hospital spending in England. We describe how costs vary across the lifecycle, and the concentration of spending among people and over time. We find that costs per person start to increase after age 50 and escalate after...

  20. [ELGA--the electronic health record in the light of data protection and data security].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ströher, Alexander; Honekamp, Wilfried

    2011-07-01

    The introduction of an electronic health record (ELGA) is a subject discussed for a long time in Austria. Another big step toward ELGA is made at the end of 2010 on the pilot project e-medication in three model regions; other projects should follow. In addition, projects of the ELGA structure are sped up on the part of the ELGA GmbH to install the base of a functioning electronic health record. Unfortunately, many of these initiatives take place, so to speak, secretly, so that in the consciousness of the general public - and that includes not only patients but also physicians and other healthcare providers - always concerns about protection and security of such a storage of health data arouse. In this article the bases of the planned act are discussed taking into account the data protection and data security.

  1. Recording of hospitalizations for acute exacerbations of COPD in UK electronic health care records

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rothnie KJ

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available Kieran J Rothnie,1,2 Hana Müllerová,3 Sara L Thomas,2 Joht S Chandan,4 Liam Smeeth,2 John R Hurst,5 Kourtney Davis,3 Jennifer K Quint1,2 1Respiratory Epidemiology, Occupational Medicine and Public Health, National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College London, London, UK; 2Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK; 3Respiratory Epidemiology, GlaxoSmithKline R&D, Uxbridge, London; 4Medical School, 5UCL Respiratory, University College London, London, UK Background: Accurate identification of hospitalizations for acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD within electronic health care records is important for research, public health, and to inform health care utilization and service provision. We aimed to develop a strategy to identify hospitalizations for AECOPD in secondary care data and to investigate the validity of strategies to identify hospitalizations for AECOPD in primary care data. Methods: We identified patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD in the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD with linked Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES data. We used discharge summaries for recent hospitalizations for AECOPD to develop a strategy to identify the recording of hospitalizations for AECOPD in HES. We then used the HES strategy as a reference standard to investigate the positive predictive value (PPV and sensitivity of strategies for identifying AECOPD using general practice CPRD data. We tested two strategies: 1 codes for hospitalization for AECOPD and 2 a code for AECOPD other than hospitalization on the same day as a code for hospitalization due to unspecified reason. Results: In total, 27,182 patients with COPD were included. Our strategy to identify hospitalizations for AECOPD in HES had a sensitivity of 87.5%. When compared with HES, using a code suggesting hospitalization for AECOPD in CPRD resulted in a PPV of 50.2% (95

  2. Obfuscatable multi-recipient re-encryption for secure privacy-preserving personal health record services.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shi, Yang; Fan, Hongfei; Xiong, Guoyue

    2015-01-01

    With the rapid development of cloud computing techniques, it is attractive for personal health record (PHR) service providers to deploy their PHR applications and store the personal health data in the cloud. However, there could be a serious privacy leakage if the cloud-based system is intruded by attackers, which makes it necessary for the PHR service provider to encrypt all patients' health data on cloud servers. Existing techniques are insufficiently secure under circumstances where advanced threats are considered, or being inefficient when many recipients are involved. Therefore, the objectives of our solution are (1) providing a secure implementation of re-encryption in white-box attack contexts and (2) assuring the efficiency of the implementation even in multi-recipient cases. We designed the multi-recipient re-encryption functionality by randomness-reusing and protecting the implementation by obfuscation. The proposed solution is secure even in white-box attack contexts. Furthermore, a comparison with other related work shows that the computational cost of the proposed solution is lower. The proposed technique can serve as a building block for supporting secure, efficient and privacy-preserving personal health record service systems.

  3. Identification and Hierarchy of Main Electronic Health Record Components in Occupational Medicine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dorin TRIFF

    2010-12-01

    Full Text Available Starting from the legal requirements relating to structuring of medical records in occupational medicine and international requirements regarding the certification of electronic health records we have focused on structuring and then evaluating an EHR model in occupational medicine that integrates the main functions and certification criteria required by the European and US certification bodies. The application we designed, called Medmun, structured for use in occupational medicine practices based on the model of medical file provided by the Romanian legislation, integrates both necessary components of occupational medicine practice for administration of characteristic information related to socio-economic unit, work place, health surveillance as well as components of specific EHR functionality. The application has been submitted for free evaluation by specialist physicians of five counties over a period of nine months and subsequently assessed using a questionnaire on the usefulness of specific functional components in the EHR occupational medicine practice. The model was positively evaluated after experimental employment by occupational health practitioners. They consider that absence of legislative support for EHR implementation in medical practice is the main obstacle to the use of such applications in occupational medicine practice.

  4. Motivation and Factors Affecting It among Health Professionals in ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    BACKGROUND: Motivation is an individual's degree of willingness to exert and maintain an effort towards organizational goals. This study assessed motivational status and factors affecting it among health professionals in public hospitals of West Shoa Zone, Oromia Region. METHOD: Facility based cross-sectional survey ...

  5. Barriers Against Adoption of Electronic Health Record in Italy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Stefano Bonacina

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available This work aims to expose the barriers which work against the satisfactory adoption and utilization of Electronic Health Records (EHRs in Italy. Experts from six operating areas were involved where barriers associated with practical daily use of EHRs might arise. Experts disclosed different barriers in their operating areas: the low interoperability of healthcare system infrastructures in diagnostic services; the lack of systems able to represent complex processes characterized by uncertainties in hospital wards; the unsatisfactory information exchange between heterogeneous healthcare providers in territorial healthcare; the lack of models and guidelines for administration process management; the lack of Health Information engineers who are recognized as professionals in Italian hospitals; the lack of domain vocabularies and ontologies for conceptual integration in clinical communication. Our findings suggest how future solutions must be designed considering the environment of specific areas.

  6. Care team identification in the electronic health record: A critical first step for patient-centered communication.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dalal, Anuj K; Schnipper, Jeffrey L

    2016-05-01

    Patient-centered communication is essential to coordinate care and safely progress patients from admission through discharge. Hospitals struggle with improving the complex and increasingly electronic conversation patterns among care team members, patients, and caregivers to achieve effective patient-centered communication across settings. Accurate and reliable identification of all care team members is a precursor to effective patient-centered communication and ideally should be facilitated by the electronic health record. However, the process of identifying care team members is challenging, and team lists in the electronic health record are typically neither accurate nor reliable. Based on the literature and on experience from 2 initiatives at our institution, we outline strategies to improve care team identification in the electronic health record and discuss potential implications for patient-centered communication. Journal of Hospital Medicine 2016;11:381-385. © 2016 Society of Hospital Medicine. © 2016 Society of Hospital Medicine.

  7. Organisational Factors Affecting Policy and Programme Decision Making in a Public Health Policy Environment

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zardo, Pauline; Collie, Alex; Livingstone, Charles

    2015-01-01

    Organisational factors can affect the success of interventions aimed at increasing research use. Research is needed to identify organisational factors affecting research use in specific public health policy contexts. Qualitative interviews with decision makers from a specific public health context identified a range of organisational factors that…

  8. Alberta oil sands community exposure and health effects assessment : analysis of health records as a proxy for health outcomes

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wang, F.; Mackenzie, A.; Schopflocher, D.; Shaw, S.; Robb, J.; Gabos, S.

    2002-01-01

    A large scale study was conducted to assess potential links between air quality and human health outcomes. Health records were used as a proxy measure for health outcomes. Residents of Fort McMurray and Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada were used in the comparison of risks of selected morbidity and mortality measures during a 3 year period between 1995 and 1998. Data on the socio-demography, morbidity, and mortality were linked by PI and geographic area from the Health Care Insurance Plan, physical and hospital billing systems, and vital statistics death registration. Age was the most important confounder. Asthma incidence for children 3 years or less was examined along with prevalence and mortality of selected diseases for each sex and age group. Results showed that the incidence of asthma varied by age and sex but not by study area. There was no major difference in death from lung cancer, cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease, respiratory disorders and COPD between residents of the target and control communities. 6 figs

  9. Interoperability of Electronic Health Records: A Physician-Driven Redesign.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Miller, Holly; Johns, Lucy

    2018-01-01

    PURPOSE: Electronic health records (EHRs), now used by hundreds of thousands of providers and encouraged by federal policy, have the potential to improve quality and decrease costs in health care. But interoperability, although technically feasible among different EHR systems, is the weak link in the chain of logic. Interoperability is inhibited by poor understanding, by suboptimal implementation, and at times by a disinclination to dilute market share or patient base on the part of vendors or providers, respectively. The intent of this project has been to develop a series of practicable recommendations that, if followed by EHR vendors and users, can promote and enhance interoperability, helping EHRs reach their potential. METHODOLOGY: A group of 11 physicians, one nurse, and one health policy consultant, practicing from California to Massachusetts, has developed a document titled "Feature and Function Recommendations To Optimize Clinician Usability of Direct Interoperability To Enhance Patient Care" that offers recommendations from the clinician point of view. This report introduces some of these recommendations and suggests their implications for policy and the "virtualization" of EHRs. CONCLUSION: Widespread adoption of even a few of these recommendations by designers and vendors would enable a major advance toward the "Triple Aim" of improving the patient experience, improving the health of populations, and reducing per capita costs.

  10. A global travelers' electronic health record template standard for personal health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Li, Yu-Chuan; Detmer, Don E; Shabbir, Syed-Abdul; Nguyen, Phung Anh; Jian, Wen-Shan; Mihalas, George I; Shortliffe, Edward H; Tang, Paul; Haux, Reinhold; Kimura, Michio

    2012-01-01

    Tourism as well as international business travel creates health risks for individuals and populations both in host societies and home countries. One strategy to reduce health-related risks to travelers is to provide travelers and relevant caregivers timely, ongoing access to their own health information. Many websites offer health advice for travelers. For example, the WHO and US Department of State offer up-to-date health information about countries relevant to travel. However, little has been done to assure travelers that their medical information is available at the right place and time when the need might arise. Applications of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) utilizing mobile phones for health management are promising tools both for the delivery of healthcare services and the promotion of personal health. This paper describes the project developed by international informaticians under the umbrella of the International Medical Informatics Association. A template capable of becoming an international standard is proposed. This application is available free to anyone who is interested. Furthermore, its source code is made open.

  11. Consumer Opinions of Health Information Exchange, e-Prescribing, and Personal Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cochran, Gary L; Lander, Lina; Morien, Marsha; Lomelin, Daniel E; Brittin, Jeri; Reker, Celeste; Klepser, Donald G

    2015-01-01

    Consumer satisfaction is a crucial component of health information technology (HIT) utilization, as high satisfaction is expected to increase HIT utilization among providers and to allow consumers to become full participants in their own healthcare management. The primary objective of this pilot study was to identify consumer perspectives on health information technologies including health information exchange (HIE), e-prescribing (e-Rx), and personal health records (PHRs). Eight focus groups were conducted in seven towns and cities across Nebraska in 2013. Each group consisted of 10-12 participants. Discussions were organized topically in the following categories: HIE, e-Rx, and PHR. The qualitative analysis consisted of immersion and crystallization to develop a coding scheme that included both preconceived and emergent themes. Common themes across focus groups were identified and compiled for each discussion category. The study had 67 participants, of which 18 (27 percent) were male. Focus group findings revealed both perceived barriers and benefits to the adoption of HIT. Common HIT concerns expressed across focus groups included privacy and security of medical information, decreases in quality of care, inconsistent provider participation, and the potential cost of implementation. Positive expectations regarding HIT included better accuracy and completeness of information, and improved communication and coordination between healthcare providers. Improvements in patient care were expected as a result of easy physician access to consolidated information across providers as well as the speed of sharing and availability of information in an emergency. In addition, participants were optimistic about patient empowerment and convenient access to and control of personal health data. Consumer concerns focused on privacy and security of the health information, as well as the cost of implementing the technologies and the possibility of an unintended negative impact on the

  12. The personal health record paradox: health care professionals' perspectives and the information ecology of personal health record systems in organizational and clinical settings.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nazi, Kim M

    2013-04-04

    Despite significant consumer interest and anticipated benefits, overall adoption of personal health records (PHRs) remains relatively low. Understanding the consumer perspective is necessary, but insufficient by itself. Consumer PHR use also has broad implications for health care professionals and organizational delivery systems; however, these have received less attention. An exclusive focus on the PHR as a tool for consumer empowerment does not adequately take into account the social and organizational context of health care delivery, and the reciprocal nature of patient engagement. The purpose of this study was to examine the experiences of physicians, nurses, and pharmacists at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) using an organizationally sponsored PHR to develop insights into the interaction of technology and processes of health care delivery. The conceptual framework for the study draws on an information ecology perspective, which recognizes that a vibrant dynamic exists among technologies, people, practices, and values, accounting for both the values and norms of the participants and the practices of the local setting. The study explores the experiences and perspectives of VA health care professionals related to patient use of the My HealtheVet PHR portal and secure messaging systems. In-depth interviews were conducted with 30 VA health care professionals engaged in providing direct patient care who self-reported that they had experiences with at least 1 of 4 PHR features. Interviews were transcribed, coded, and analyzed to identify inductive themes. Organizational documents and artifacts were reviewed and analyzed to trace the trajectory of secure messaging implementation as part of the VA Patient Aligned Care Team (PACT) model. Study findings revealed a variety of factors that have facilitated or inhibited PHR adoption, use, and endorsement of patient use by health care professionals. Health care professionals' accounts and analysis of organizational

  13. Facilitating the ethical use of health data for the benefit of society: electronic health records, consent and the duty of easy rescue.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Porsdam Mann, Sebastian; Savulescu, Julian; Sahakian, Barbara J

    2016-12-28

    Advances in data science allow for sophisticated analysis of increasingly large datasets. In the medical context, large volumes of data collected for healthcare purposes are contained in electronic health records (EHRs). The real-life character and sheer amount of data contained in them make EHRs an attractive resource for public health and biomedical research. However, medical records contain sensitive information that could be misused by third parties. Medical confidentiality and respect for patients' privacy and autonomy protect patient data, barring access to health records unless consent is given by the data subject. This creates a situation in which much of the beneficial records-based research is prevented from being used or is seriously undermined, because the refusal of consent by some patients introduces a systematic deviation, known as selection bias, from a representative sample of the general population, thus distorting research findings. Although research exemptions for the requirement of informed consent exist, they are rarely used in practice due to concerns over liability and a general culture of caution. In this paper, we argue that the problem of research access to sensitive data can be understood as a tension between the medical duties of confidentiality and beneficence. We attempt to show that the requirement of informed consent is not appropriate for all kinds of records-based research by distinguishing studies involving minimal risk from those that feature moderate or greater risks. We argue that the duty of easy rescue-the principle that persons should benefit others when this can be done at no or minimal risk to themselves-grounds the removal of consent requirements for minimally risky records-based research. Drawing on this discussion, we propose a risk-adapted framework for the facilitation of ethical uses of health data for the benefit of society.This article is part of the themed issue 'The ethical impact of data science'. © 2015 The

  14. Electronic Health Record-Related Events in Medical Malpractice Claims.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Graber, Mark L; Siegal, Dana; Riah, Heather; Johnston, Doug; Kenyon, Kathy

    2015-11-06

    There is widespread agreement that the full potential of health information technology (health IT) has not yet been realized and of particular concern are the examples of unintended consequences of health IT that detract from the safety of health care or from the use of health IT itself. The goal of this project was to obtain additional information on these health IT-related problems, using a mixed methods (qualitative and quantitative) analysis of electronic health record-related harm in cases submitted to a large database of malpractice suits and claims. Cases submitted to the CRICO claims database and coded during 2012 and 2013 were analyzed. A total of 248 cases (<1%) involving health IT were identified and coded using a proprietary taxonomy that identifies user- and system-related sociotechnical factors. Ambulatory care accounted for most of the cases (146 cases). Cases were most typically filed as a result of an error involving medications (31%), diagnosis (28%), or a complication of treatment (31%). More than 80% of cases involved moderate or severe harm, although lethal cases were less likely in cases from ambulatory settings. Etiologic factors spanned all of the sociotechnical dimensions, and many recurring patterns of error were identified. Adverse events associated with health IT vulnerabilities can cause extensive harm and are encountered across the continuum of health care settings and sociotechnical factors. The recurring patterns provide valuable lessons that both practicing clinicians and health IT developers could use to reduce the risk of harm in the future. The likelihood of harm seems to relate more to a patient's particular situation than to any one class of error.This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives License 4.0 (CCBY-NC-ND), where it is permissible to download and share thework provided it is properly cited. The work cannot be changed in any way or used

  15. Communication and the electronic health record training: a comparison of three healthcare systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Michelle H Lynott

    2013-12-01

    Full Text Available Background The electronic health record (EHR used in the examination room, is becoming the primary method of medical data storage in primary care practice in the USA. One of the challenges in using EHRs is maintaining effective patient–provider communication. Many studies have focused on communication in the examination room.Purpose Scant research exists on the best methods in educating nurse practitioners and other primary care providers (clinicians. The purpose of this study was to explore various health record training programmes for clinicians.Methods One researcher participated in and observed three health systems’ EHR training programmes for ambulatory care providers in the Pacific Northwest. A focused ethnographic approach was used, emphasising patient–provider communication.Results Only one system had formalised communication training in their class, the other two systems emphasised only the software and data aspects of the EHR.Conclusions The fact that clinicians are expected to use EHRs in the examination room necessitates the inclusion of communication training in EHR training programmes and/or as a part of primary care nurse practitioner education programmes.

  16. Communication and the electronic health record training: a comparison of three healthcare systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lynott, Michelle H; Kooienga, Sarah A; Stewart, Valerie T

    2012-01-01

    The electronic health record (EHR) used in the examination room, is becoming the primary method of medical data storage in primary care practice in the USA. One of the challenges in using EHRs is maintaining effective patient-provider communication. Many studies have focused on communication in the examination room. Scant research exists on the best methods in educating nurse practitioners and other primary care providers (clinicians). The purpose of this study was to explore various health record training programmes for clinicians. One researcher participated in and observed three health systems' EHR training programmes for ambulatory care providers in the Pacific Northwest. A focused ethnographic approach was used, emphasising patient-provider communication. Only one system had formalised communication training in their class, the other two systems emphasised only the software and data aspects of the EHR. The fact that clinicians are expected to use EHRs in the examination room necessitates the inclusion of communication training in EHR training programmes and/or as a part of primary care nurse practitioner education programmes.

  17. Casebook: a virtual patient iPad application for teaching decision-making through the use of electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bloice, Marcus D; Simonic, Klaus-Martin; Holzinger, Andreas

    2014-08-07

    Virtual Patients are a well-known and widely used form of interactive software used to simulate aspects of patient care that students are increasingly less likely to encounter during their studies. However, to take full advantage of the benefits of using Virtual Patients, students should have access to multitudes of cases. In order to promote the creation of collections of cases, a tablet application was developed which makes use of electronic health records as material for Virtual Patient cases. Because electronic health records are abundantly available on hospital information systems, this results in much material for the basis of case creation. An iPad-based Virtual Patient interactive software system was developed entitled Casebook. The application has been designed to read specially formatted patient cases that have been created using electronic health records, in the form of X-ray images, electrocardiograms, lab reports, and physician notes, and present these to the medical student. These health records are organised into a timeline, and the student navigates the case while answering questions regarding the patient along the way. Each health record can also be annotated with meta-information by the case designer, such as insight into the thought processes and the decision-making rationale of the physician who originally worked with the patient. Students learn decision-making skills by observing and interacting with real patient cases in this simulated environment. This paper discusses our approach in detail. Our group is of the opinion that Virtual Patient cases, targeted at undergraduate students, should concern patients who exhibit prototypical symptoms of the kind students may encounter when beginning their first medical jobs. Learning theory research has shown that students learn decision-making skills best when they have access to multitudes of patient cases and it is this plurality that allows students to develop their illness scripts effectively

  18. Honoring Dental Patients' Privacy Rule Right of Access in the Context of Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ramoni, Rachel B; Asher, Sheetal R; White, Joel M; Vaderhobli, Ram; Ogunbodede, Eyitope O; Walji, Muhammad F; Riedy, Christine; Kalenderian, Elsbeth

    2016-06-01

    A person's right to access his or her protected health information is a core feature of the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rule. If the information is stored electronically, covered entities must be able to provide patients with some type of machine-readable, electronic copy of their data. The aim of this study was to understand how academic dental institutions execute the Privacy Rule's right of access in the context of electronic health records (EHRs). A validated electronic survey was distributed to the clinical deans of 62 U.S. dental schools during a two-month period in 2014. The response rate to the survey was 53.2% (N=33). However, three surveys were partially completed, and of the 30 completed surveys, the 24 respondents who reported using axiUm as the EHR at their dental school clinic were the ones on which the results were based (38.7% of total schools at the time). Of the responses analyzed, 86% agreed that clinical modules should be considered part of a patient's dental record, and all agreed that student teaching-related modules should not. Great variability existed among these clinical deans as to whether administrative and financial modules should be considered part of a patient record. When patients request their records, close to 50% of responding schools provide the information exclusively on paper. This study found variation among dental schools in their implementation of the Privacy Rule right of access, and although all the respondents had adopted EHRs, a large number return records in paper format.

  19. Anthropometric record to be used in Centers for Family Health Support: possibilities and obstacles

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Camila Fabiana Rossi Squarcini

    2015-02-01

    Full Text Available DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1980-0037.2015v17n2p248   A model of an anthropometric record to be used in the Núcleos de Apoio à Saúde da Família (Centers for Family Health Support in Brazil has been proposed in the literature, showing the logistics of use. The aim of this study was to discuss the anthropometric record, showing the potential and obstacles of its use. It was observed that, for adults, the screening measures (body mass index and waist circumference for the determination of the risk of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases can be considered promising, although the Basic Health Care network already uses these measures. Nevertheless, the supplementary assessment (skinfold thickness and body circumferences could be another potential possibility, except for the time spent to perform this assessment and the lack of studies of the cost-benefit of these anthropometric techniques. It was concluded that the anthropometric record proposed is an important instrument for improving the quality of the service provided to users of the Basic Health Care System; however, some adjustments, such as the removal of skinfold measurements as part of primary care, should be taken into consideration.

  20. Privacy preservation and information security protection for patients' portable electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Huang, Lu-Chou; Chu, Huei-Chung; Lien, Chung-Yueh; Hsiao, Chia-Hung; Kao, Tsair

    2009-09-01

    As patients face the possibility of copying and keeping their electronic health records (EHRs) through portable storage media, they will encounter new risks to the protection of their private information. In this study, we propose a method to preserve the privacy and security of patients' portable medical records in portable storage media to avoid any inappropriate or unintentional disclosure. Following HIPAA guidelines, the method is designed to protect, recover and verify patient's identifiers in portable EHRs. The results of this study show that our methods are effective in ensuring both information security and privacy preservation for patients through portable storage medium.

  1. Patient-centered communication in the era of electronic health records: What does the evidence say?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rathert, Cheryl; Mittler, Jessica N; Banerjee, Sudeep; McDaniel, Jennifer

    2017-01-01

    Patient-physician communication is essential for patient-centered health care. Physicians are concerned that electronic health records (EHRs) negatively affect communication with patients. This study identified a framework for understanding communication functions that influence patient outcomes. We then conducted a systematic review of the literature and organized it within the framework to better understand what is known. A comprehensive search of three databases (CINAHL, Medline, PsycINFO) yielded 41 articles for analysis. Results indicated that EHR use improves capture and sharing of certain biomedical information. However, it may interfere with collection of psychosocial and emotional information, and therefore may interfere with development of supportive, healing relationships. Patient access to the EHR and messaging functions may improve communication, patient empowerment, engagement, and self-management. More rigorous examination of EHR impacts on communication functions and their influences on patient outcomes is imperative for achieving patient-centered care. By focusing on the role of communication functions on patient outcomes, future EHRs can be developed to facilitate care. Training alone is likely to be insufficient to address disruptions to communication processes. Processes must be improved, and EHRs must be developed to capture useful data without interfering with physicians' and patients' abilities to effectively communicate. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  2. Childhood obesity trends from primary care electronic health records in England between 1994 and 2013: population-based cohort study

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Jaarsveld, C.H.M. van; Gulliford, M.C.

    2015-01-01

    OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to use primary care electronic health records to evaluate the prevalence of overweight and obesity in 2-15-year-old children in England and compare trends over the last two decades. DESIGN: Cohort study of primary care electronic health records. SETTING: 375 general

  3. Optimizing the electronic health record to standardize administration and documentation of nutritional supplements.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Citty, Sandra W; Kamel, Amir; Garvan, Cynthia; Marlowe, Lee; Westhoff, Lynn

    2017-01-01

    Malnutrition in hospitalized patients is a major cause for hospital re-admission, pressure ulcers and increased hospital costs. Methods to improve the administration and documentation of nutritional supplements for hospitalized patients are needed to improve patient care, outcomes and resource utilization. Staff at a medium-sized academic health science center hospital in the southeastern United States noted that nutritional supplements ordered for patients at high risk for malnutrition were not offered or administered to patients in a standardized manner and/or not documented clearly in the electronic health record as per prescription. This paper reports on a process improvement project that redesigned the ordering, administration and documentation process of oral nutritional supplements in the electronic health record. By adding nutritional products to the medication order sets and adding an electronic nutrition administration record (ENAR) tab, the multidisciplinary team sought to standardize nutritional supplement ordering, documentation and administration at prescribed intervals. This process improvement project used a triangulated approach to evaluating pre- and post-process change including: medical record reviews, patient interviews, and nutrition formula room log reports. Staff education and training was carried out prior to initiation of the system changes. This process change resulted in an average decrease in the return of unused nutritional formula from 76% returned at baseline to 54% post-process change. The process change resulted in 100% of nutritional supplement orders having documentation about nutritional medication administration and/or reason for non-administration. Documentation in the ENAR showed that 41% of ONS orders were given and 59% were not given. Significantly more patients reported being offered the ONS product (p=0.0001) after process redesign and more patients (5% before ENAR and 86% after ENAR reported being offered the correct

  4. Factors influencing consumer adoption of USB-based Personal Health Records in Taiwan

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jian Wen-Shan

    2012-08-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Usually patients receive healthcare services from multiple hospitals, and consequently their healthcare data are dispersed over many facilities’ paper and electronic-based record systems. Therefore, many countries have encouraged the research on data interoperability, access, and patient authorization. This study is an important part of a national project to build an information exchange environment for cross-hospital digital medical records carried out by the Department of Health (DOH of Taiwan in May 2008. The key objective of the core project is to set up a portable data exchange environment in order to enable people to maintain and own their essential health information. This study is aimed at exploring the factors influencing behavior and adoption of USB-based Personal Health Records (PHR in Taiwan. Methods Quota sampling was used, and structured questionnaires were distributed to the outpatient department at ten medical centers which participated in the DOH project to establish the information exchange environment across hospitals. A total of 3000 questionnaires were distributed and 1549 responses were collected, out of those 1465 were valid, accumulating the response rate to 48.83%. Results 1025 out of 1465 respondents had expressed their willingness to apply for the USB-PHR. Detailed analysis of the data reflected that there was a remarkable difference in the “usage intention” between the PHR adopters and non-adopters (χ2 =182.4, p  Conclusions Higher Usage Intentions, Perceived Usefulness and Subjective Norm of patients were found to be the key factors influencing PHR adoption. Thus, we suggest that government and hospitals should promote the potential usefulness of PHR, and physicians should encourage patients' to adopt the PHR.

  5. Patients prefer electronic medical records - fact or fiction?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Masiza, Melissa; Mostert-Phipps, Nicky; Pottasa, Dalenca

    2013-01-01

    Incomplete patient medical history compromises the quality of care provided to a patient while well-kept, adequate patient medical records are central to the provision of good quality of care. According to research, patients have the right to contribute to decision-making affecting their health. Hence, the researchers investigated their views regarding a paper-based system and an electronic medical record (EMR). An explorative approach was used in conducting a survey within selected general practices in the Nelson Mandela Metropole. The majority of participants thought that the use of a paper-based system had no negative impact on their health. Participants expressed concerns relating to the confidentiality of their medical records with both storage mediums. The majority of participants indicated they prefer their GP to computerise their consultation details. The main objective of the research on which this poster is based was to investigate the storage medium of preference for patients and the reasons for their preference. Overall, 48% of the 85 participants selected EMRs as their preferred storage medium and the reasons for their preference were also uncovered.

  6. Automatic address validation and health record review to identify homeless Social Security disability applicants.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Erickson, Jennifer; Abbott, Kenneth; Susienka, Lucinda

    2018-06-01

    Homeless patients face a variety of obstacles in pursuit of basic social services. Acknowledging this, the Social Security Administration directs employees to prioritize homeless patients and handle their disability claims with special care. However, under existing manual processes for identification of homelessness, many homeless patients never receive the special service to which they are entitled. In this paper, we explore address validation and automatic annotation of electronic health records to improve identification of homeless patients. We developed a sample of claims containing medical records at the moment of arrival in a single office. Using address validation software, we reconciled patient addresses with public directories of homeless shelters, veterans' hospitals and clinics, and correctional facilities. Other tools annotated electronic health records. We trained random forests to identify homeless patients and validated each model with 10-fold cross validation. For our finished model, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.942. The random forest improved sensitivity from 0.067 to 0.879 but decreased positive predictive value to 0.382. Presumed false positive classifications bore many characteristics of homelessness. Organizations could use these methods to prompt early collection of information necessary to avoid labor-intensive attempts to reestablish contact with homeless individuals. Annually, such methods could benefit tens of thousands of patients who are homeless, destitute, and in urgent need of assistance. We were able to identify many more homeless patients through a combination of automatic address validation and natural language processing of unstructured electronic health records. Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  7. Electronic health records approaches and challenges: a comparison between Malaysia and four East Asian countries.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Abd Ghani, Mohd Khanapi; Bali, Rajeev K; Naguib, Raouf N G; Marshall, Ian M

    2008-01-01

    An integrated Lifetime Health Record (LHR) is fundamental for achieving seamless and continuous access to patient medical information and for the continuum of care. However, the aim has not yet been fully realised. The efforts are actively progressing around the globe. Every stage of the development of the LHR initiatives had presented peculiar challenges. The best lessons in life are those of someone else's experiences. This paper presents an overview of the development approaches undertaken by four East Asian countries in implementing a national Electronic Health Record (EHR) in the public health system. The major challenges elicited from the review including integration efforts, process reengineering, funding, people, and law and regulation will be presented, compared, discussed and used as lessons learned for the further development of the Malaysian integrated LHR.

  8. Fragmented implementation of maternal and child health home-based records in Vietnam: need for integration

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aiga, Hirotsugu; Nguyen, Vinh Duc; Nguyen, Cuong Dinh; Nguyen, Tho Thi Thi; Nguyen, Lien Thi Phuong

    2016-01-01

    Background Home-based records (HBRs) are globally implemented as the effective tools that encourage pregnant women and mothers to timely and adequately utilise maternal and child health (MCH) services. While availability and utilisation of nationally representative HBRs have been assessed in several earlier studies, the reality of a number of HBRs subnationally implemented in a less coordinated manner has been neither reported nor analysed. Objectives This study is aimed at estimating the prevalence of HBRs for MCH and the level of fragmentation of and overlapping between different HBRs for MCH in Vietnam. The study further attempts to identify health workers’ and mothers’ perceptions towards HBR operations and utilisations. Design A self-administered questionnaire was sent to the provincial health departments of 28 selected provinces. A copy of each HBR available was collected from them. A total of 20 semi-structured interviews with health workers and mothers were conducted at rural communities in four of 28 selected provinces. Results Whereas HBRs developed exclusively for maternal health and exclusively for child health were available in four provinces (14%) and in 28 provinces (100%), respectively, those for both maternal health and child health were available in nine provinces (32%). The mean number of HBRs in 28 provinces (=5.75) indicates over-availability of HBRs. All 119 minimum required items for recording found in three different HBRs under nationwide scale-up were also included in the Maternal and Child Health Handbook being piloted for nationwide scaling-up. Implementation of multiple HBRs is likely to confuse not only health workers by requiring them to record the same data on several HBRs but also mothers about which HBR they should refer to and rely on at home. Conclusions To enable both health workers and pregnant women to focus on only one type of HBR, province-specific HBRs for maternal and/or child health need to be nationally standardised

  9. CMS Records Schedule

    Data.gov (United States)

    U.S. Department of Health & Human Services — The CMS Records Schedule provides disposition authorizations approved by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) for CMS program-related records...

  10. The Impact of Electronic Health Records on Healthcare Professional's Beliefs and Attitudes toward Face to Face Communication

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nickles, Kenneth Patrick

    2012-01-01

    The impact of electronic health records on healthcare professional's beliefs and attitudes toward face to face communication during patient and provider interactions was examined. Quantitative survey research assessed user attitudes towards an electronic health record system and revealed that healthcare professionals from a wide range of…

  11. 29 CFR 1960.19 - Other Federal agency standards affecting occupational safety and health.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... safety and health. 1960.19 Section 1960.19 Labor Regulations Relating to Labor (Continued) OCCUPATIONAL... EMPLOYEE OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH PROGRAMS AND RELATED MATTERS Standards § 1960.19 Other Federal agency standards affecting occupational safety and health. (a) Where employees of different agencies...

  12. Analysis of the security and privacy requirements of cloud-based electronic health records systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rodrigues, Joel J P C; de la Torre, Isabel; Fernández, Gonzalo; López-Coronado, Miguel

    2013-08-21

    The Cloud Computing paradigm offers eHealth systems the opportunity to enhance the features and functionality that they offer. However, moving patients' medical information to the Cloud implies several risks in terms of the security and privacy of sensitive health records. In this paper, the risks of hosting Electronic Health Records (EHRs) on the servers of third-party Cloud service providers are reviewed. To protect the confidentiality of patient information and facilitate the process, some suggestions for health care providers are made. Moreover, security issues that Cloud service providers should address in their platforms are considered. To show that, before moving patient health records to the Cloud, security and privacy concerns must be considered by both health care providers and Cloud service providers. Security requirements of a generic Cloud service provider are analyzed. To study the latest in Cloud-based computing solutions, bibliographic material was obtained mainly from Medline sources. Furthermore, direct contact was made with several Cloud service providers. Some of the security issues that should be considered by both Cloud service providers and their health care customers are role-based access, network security mechanisms, data encryption, digital signatures, and access monitoring. Furthermore, to guarantee the safety of the information and comply with privacy policies, the Cloud service provider must be compliant with various certifications and third-party requirements, such as SAS70 Type II, PCI DSS Level 1, ISO 27001, and the US Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA). Storing sensitive information such as EHRs in the Cloud means that precautions must be taken to ensure the safety and confidentiality of the data. A relationship built on trust with the Cloud service provider is essential to ensure a transparent process. Cloud service providers must make certain that all security mechanisms are in place to avoid unauthorized access

  13. “Nothing About Me Without Me”: An Interpretative Review of Patient Accessible Electronic Health Records

    Science.gov (United States)

    Callahan, Ryan; Sevdalis, Nick; Mayer, Erik K; Darzi, Ara

    2015-01-01

    Background Patient accessible electronic health records (PAEHRs) enable patients to access and manage personal clinical information that is made available to them by their health care providers (HCPs). It is thought that the shared management nature of medical record access improves patient outcomes and improves patient satisfaction. However, recent reviews have found that this is not the case. Furthermore, little research has focused on PAEHRs from the HCP viewpoint. HCPs include physicians, nurses, and service providers. Objective We provide a systematic review of reviews of the impact of giving patients record access from both a patient and HCP point of view. The review covers a broad range of outcome measures, including patient safety, patient satisfaction, privacy and security, self-efficacy, and health outcome. Methods A systematic search was conducted using Web of Science to identify review articles on the impact of PAEHRs. Our search was limited to English-language reviews published between January 2002 and November 2014. A total of 73 citations were retrieved from a series of Boolean search terms including “review*” with “patient access to records”. These reviews went through a novel scoring system analysis whereby we calculated how many positive outcomes were reported per every outcome measure investigated. This provided a way to quantify the impact of PAEHRs. Results Ten reviews covering chronic patients (eg, diabetes and hypertension) and primary care patients, as well as HCPs were found but eight were included for the analysis of outcome measures. We found mixed outcomes across both patient and HCP groups, with approximately half of the reviews showing positive changes with record access. Patients believe that record access increases their perception of control; however, outcome measures thought to create psychological concerns (such as patient anxiety as a result of seeing their medical record) are still unanswered. Nurses are more likely than

  14. Electronic health record usability: analysis of the user-centered design processes of eleven electronic health record vendors.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ratwani, Raj M; Fairbanks, Rollin J; Hettinger, A Zachary; Benda, Natalie C

    2015-11-01

    The usability of electronic health records (EHRs) continues to be a point of dissatisfaction for providers, despite certification requirements from the Office of the National Coordinator that require EHR vendors to employ a user-centered design (UCD) process. To better understand factors that contribute to poor usability, a research team visited 11 different EHR vendors in order to analyze their UCD processes and discover the specific challenges that vendors faced as they sought to integrate UCD with their EHR development. Our analysis demonstrates a diverse range of vendors' UCD practices that fall into 3 categories: well-developed UCD, basic UCD, and misconceptions of UCD. Specific challenges to practicing UCD include conducting contextually rich studies of clinical workflow, recruiting participants for usability studies, and having support from leadership within the vendor organization. The results of the study provide novel insights for how to improve usability practices of EHR vendors. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

  15. Overcoming barriers to implementing patient-reported outcomes in an electronic health record: a case report.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Harle, Christopher A; Listhaus, Alyson; Covarrubias, Constanza M; Schmidt, Siegfried Of; Mackey, Sean; Carek, Peter J; Fillingim, Roger B; Hurley, Robert W

    2016-01-01

    In this case report, the authors describe the implementation of a system for collecting patient-reported outcomes and integrating results in an electronic health record. The objective was to identify lessons learned in overcoming barriers to collecting and integrating patient-reported outcomes in an electronic health record. The authors analyzed qualitative data in 42 documents collected from system development meetings, written feedback from users, and clinical observations with practice staff, providers, and patients. Guided by the Unified Theory on the Adoption and Use of Information Technology, 5 emergent themes were identified. Two barriers emerged: (i) uncertain clinical benefit and (ii) time, work flow, and effort constraints. Three facilitators emerged: (iii) process automation, (iv) usable system interfaces, and (v) collecting patient-reported outcomes for the right patient at the right time. For electronic health record-integrated patient-reported outcomes to succeed as useful clinical tools, system designers must ensure the clinical relevance of the information being collected while minimizing provider, staff, and patient burden. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

  16. The patients' active role in managing a personal electronic health record: a qualitative analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baudendistel, Ines; Winkler, Eva; Kamradt, Martina; Brophy, Sarah; Längst, Gerda; Eckrich, Felicitas; Heinze, Oliver; Bergh, Bjoern; Szecsenyi, Joachim; Ose, Dominik

    2015-09-01

    The complexity of illness and cross-sectoral health care pose challenges for patients with colorectal cancer and their families. Within a patient-centered care paradigm, it is vital to give patients the opportunity to play an active role. Prospective users' attitudes regarding the patients' role in the context of a patient-controlled electronic health record (PEPA) were explored. A qualitative study across regional health care settings and health professions was conducted. Overall, 10 focus groups were performed collecting views of 3 user groups: patients with colorectal cancer (n = 12) and representatives from patient support groups (n = 2), physicians (n = 17), and other health care professionals (HCPs) (n = 16). Data were audio- and videotaped, transcribed verbatim and thematically analyzed using qualitative content analysis. The patients' responsibility as a gatekeeper and access manager was at the center of the focus group discussions, although HCPs addressed aspects that would limit patients taking an active role (e.g., illness related issues). Despite expressed concerns, PEPAs possibility to enhance personal responsibility was seen in all user groups. Giving patients an active role in managing a personal electronic health record is an innovative patient-centered approach, although existing restraints have to be recognized. To enhance user adoption and advance PEPAs potential, key user needs have to be addressed.

  17. Demographics of dogs, cats, and rabbits attending veterinary practices in Great Britain as recorded in their electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sánchez-Vizcaíno, Fernando; Noble, Peter-John M; Jones, Phil H; Menacere, Tarek; Buchan, Iain; Reynolds, Suzanna; Dawson, Susan; Gaskell, Rosalind M; Everitt, Sally; Radford, Alan D

    2017-07-11

    Understanding the distribution and determinants of disease in animal populations must be underpinned by knowledge of animal demographics. For companion animals, these data have been difficult to collect because of the distributed nature of the companion animal veterinary industry. Here we describe key demographic features of a large veterinary-visiting pet population in Great Britain as recorded in electronic health records, and explore the association between a range of animal's characteristics and socioeconomic factors. Electronic health records were captured by the Small Animal Veterinary Surveillance Network (SAVSNET), from 143 practices (329 sites) in Great Britain. Mixed logistic regression models were used to assess the association between socioeconomic factors and species and breed ownership, and preventative health care interventions. Dogs made up 64.8% of the veterinary-visiting population, with cats, rabbits and other species making up 30.3, 2.0 and 1.6% respectively. Compared to cats, dogs and rabbits were more likely to be purebred and younger. Neutering was more common in cats (77.0%) compared to dogs (57.1%) and rabbits (45.8%). The insurance and microchipping relative frequency was highest in dogs (27.9 and 53.1%, respectively). Dogs in the veterinary-visiting population belonging to owners living in least-deprived areas of Great Britain were more likely to be purebred, neutered, insured and microchipped. The same association was found for cats in England and for certain parameters in Wales and Scotland. The differences we observed within these populations are likely to impact on the clinical diseases observed within individual veterinary practices that care for them. Based on this descriptive study, there is an indication that the population structures of companion animals co-vary with human and environmental factors such as the predicted socioeconomic level linked to the owner's address. This 'co-demographic' information suggests that further

  18. Dreams and nightmares: practical and ethical issues for patients and physicians using personal health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wynia, Matthew; Dunn, Kyle

    2010-01-01

    Electronic health records for patients, personal health records (PHRs), have become increasingly popular among policy makers and purchasers, but uptake among patients and physicians has been relatively slow. PHRs have varying uses that might make them more or less appealing to different stakeholders. The three core uses for PHRs - promoting communication, data use, and patient responsibility - each raises a set of potential practical and financial dilemmas. But some ethical concerns are also at play, some of which are rarely recognized as values-based barriers to the use of PHRs. Recognizing these ethical issues, and addressing them explicitly in PHR design and policy making, would help PHRs to achieve their promise.

  19. Detecting Inappropriate Access to Electronic Health Records Using Collaborative Filtering.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Menon, Aditya Krishna; Jiang, Xiaoqian; Kim, Jihoon; Vaidya, Jaideep; Ohno-Machado, Lucila

    2014-04-01

    Many healthcare facilities enforce security on their electronic health records (EHRs) through a corrective mechanism: some staff nominally have almost unrestricted access to the records, but there is a strict ex post facto audit process for inappropriate accesses, i.e., accesses that violate the facility's security and privacy policies. This process is inefficient, as each suspicious access has to be reviewed by a security expert, and is purely retrospective, as it occurs after damage may have been incurred. This motivates automated approaches based on machine learning using historical data. Previous attempts at such a system have successfully applied supervised learning models to this end, such as SVMs and logistic regression. While providing benefits over manual auditing, these approaches ignore the identity of the users and patients involved in a record access. Therefore, they cannot exploit the fact that a patient whose record was previously involved in a violation has an increased risk of being involved in a future violation. Motivated by this, in this paper, we propose a collaborative filtering inspired approach to predicting inappropriate accesses. Our solution integrates both explicit and latent features for staff and patients, the latter acting as a personalized "finger-print" based on historical access patterns. The proposed method, when applied to real EHR access data from two tertiary hospitals and a file-access dataset from Amazon, shows not only significantly improved performance compared to existing methods, but also provides insights as to what indicates an inappropriate access.

  20. When and How Should Clinicians Share Details from a Health Record with Patients with Mental Illness?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thom, Robyn P; Farrell, Helen M

    2017-03-01

    Stigma associated with mental illness-a public health crisis-is perpetuated by the language used to describe and document it. Psychiatric pathology and how it can be perceived among clinicians contribute to the marginalization of patients, which exacerbates their vulnerability. Clinical documentation of mental illness has long been mired in pejorative language that perpetuates negative assumptions about those with mental illness. Although patients have the legal right to view their health record, sharing mental health notes with patients remains a sensitive issue, largely due to clinicians' fears that review of this content might cause harm, specifically psychiatric destabilization. However, the ethical principles of justice, beneficence, and autonomy as well as nonmaleficence must be considered by clinicians in determining when and how to share psychiatric details from a health record with their patients. © 2017 American Medical Association. All Rights Reserved.

  1. Household characteristics affecting drinking water quality and human health

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kausar, S.; Maann, A.A.; Zafar, I.; Ali, T.

    2009-01-01

    Pakistan's water crisis, especially serious water shortages have had a great impact on the health of the general population. Today majority of Pakistanis have no access to improved water sources which force people to consume polluted drinking water that results in the shape of waterborne diseases. In addition to this, household characteristics, includes mother's education and family income, also have an impact on drinking water quality and ultimately on human health. This study was conducted in three districts of Province Punjab both in urban and rural areas. The sample size of this study was 600 females of age group 20-60 years. From the data, it was concluded that mother's education and family income were affecting drinking water quality and human health. As the mother's years of education increased, the health issues decreased. Similarly, as the level of income increased, people suffered from water related diseases decreased. (author)

  2. Collecting psychosocial "vital signs" in electronic health records: Why now? What are they? What's new for psychology?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Matthews, Karen A; Adler, Nancy E; Forrest, Christopher B; Stead, William W

    2016-09-01

    Social, psychological, and behavioral factors are recognized as key contributors to health, but they are rarely measured in a systematic way in health care settings. Electronic health records (EHRs) can be used in these settings to routinely collect a standardized set of social, psychological, and behavioral determinants of health. The expanded use of EHRs provides opportunities to improve individual and population health, and offers new ways for the psychological community to engage in health promotion and disease prevention efforts. This article addresses 3 issues. First, it discusses what led to current efforts to include measures of psychosocial and behavioral determinants of health in EHRs. Second, it presents recommendations of an Institute of Medicine committee regarding inclusion in EHRS of a panel of measures that meet a priori criteria. Third, it identifies new opportunities and challenges these recommendations present for psychologists in practice and research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

  3. Query Log Analysis of an Electronic Health Record Search Engine

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yang, Lei; Mei, Qiaozhu; Zheng, Kai; Hanauer, David A.

    2011-01-01

    We analyzed a longitudinal collection of query logs of a full-text search engine designed to facilitate information retrieval in electronic health records (EHR). The collection, 202,905 queries and 35,928 user sessions recorded over a course of 4 years, represents the information-seeking behavior of 533 medical professionals, including frontline practitioners, coding personnel, patient safety officers, and biomedical researchers for patient data stored in EHR systems. In this paper, we present descriptive statistics of the queries, a categorization of information needs manifested through the queries, as well as temporal patterns of the users’ information-seeking behavior. The results suggest that information needs in medical domain are substantially more sophisticated than those that general-purpose web search engines need to accommodate. Therefore, we envision there exists a significant challenge, along with significant opportunities, to provide intelligent query recommendations to facilitate information retrieval in EHR. PMID:22195150

  4. Factors Affecting The Adoption Of Mhealth In Maternal Health Care In Nakuru Provincial General Hospital

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Simon Munyua

    2015-08-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Access to timely and quality maternal health care remains to be a major development challenge in many developing economies particularly in Kenya. The countrys system of providing maternal health care also continue to be anchored on conventional methods of physical presence of the patient and the doctor in a hospital setup. The countrys ICT and health policies also place very little emphasis on the use of these platforms. This study therefore sought to establish the factors affecting the adoption of mHealth by focusing on maternal health in Nakuru Provincial General Hospital. Objectives of the study were to determine the extent to knowledge and awareness affects the adoption of mHealth in maternal health care at Nakuru PGH to identify the government policies affecting the adoption of mHealth in maternal health care at Nakuru PGH to assess how access to technology affects the adoption of mHealth in maternal healthcare to establish the effects of ICT infrastructure on the adoption of mHealth in maternal health care and to identify the cost aspects affecting the adoption of mHealth in maternal health care at Nakuru Provincial General Hospital. It is envisaged that the study could provide useful information on the adoption of mHealth in managing maternal health care in Nakuru Provincial General Hospital. Descriptive survey research design will be used where all the medical staff and patients of Nakuru Provincial General Hospital was surveyed. The study population therefore was made up of 24 medical staff and 3460 mothers visiting the antenatal clinic selected using clustered random sampling technique. The main instrument for primary data collection was the questionnaire. Data analysis was then done using both descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics to be used include frequency counts percentages and measures of central tendency. Inferential statistics on the other hand include t-test analysis and spearman correlation

  5. A Record Linkage Protocol for a Diabetes Registry at Ethnically Diverse Community Health Centers

    OpenAIRE

    Maizlish, Neil A.; Herrera, Linda

    2005-01-01

    Community health centers serve ethnically diverse populations that may pose challenges for record linkage based on name and date of birth. The objective was to identify an optimal deterministic algorithm to link patient encounters and laboratory results for hemoglobin A1c testing and examine its variability by health center site, patient ethnicity, and other variables. Based on data elements of last name, first name, date of birth, gender, and health center site, matches with ≥50% to < 100% o...

  6. Advance Care Planning Documentation in Electronic Health Records: Current Challenges and Recommendations for Change.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lamas, Daniela; Panariello, Natalie; Henrich, Natalie; Hammes, Bernard; Hanson, Laura C; Meier, Diane E; Guinn, Nancy; Corrigan, Janet; Hubber, Sean; Luetke-Stahlman, Hannah; Block, Susan

    2018-04-01

    To develop a set of clinically relevant recommendations to improve the state of advance care planning (ACP) documentation in the electronic health record (EHR). Advance care planning (ACP) is a key process that supports goal-concordant care. For preferences to be honored, clinicians must be able to reliably record, find, and use ACP documentation. However, there are no standards to guide ACP documentation in the electronic health record (EHR). We interviewed 21 key informants to understand the strengths and weaknesses of EHR documentation systems for ACP and identify best practices. We analyzed these interviews using a qualitative content analysis approach and subsequently developed a preliminary set of recommendations. These recommendations were vetted and refined in a second round of input from a national panel of content experts. Informants identified six themes regarding current inadequacies in documentation and accessibility of ACP information and opportunities for improvement. We offer a set of concise, clinically relevant recommendations, informed by expert opinion, to improve the state of ACP documentation in the EHR.

  7. Importance-Performance Analysis of Personal Health Records in Taiwan: A Web-Based Survey.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rau, Hsiao-Hsien; Wu, Yi-Syuan; Chu, Chi-Ming; Wang, Fu-Chung; Hsu, Min-Huei; Chang, Chi-Wen; Chen, Kang-Hua; Lee, Yen-Liang; Kao, Senyeong; Chiu, Yu-Lung; Wen, Hsyien-Chia; Fuad, Anis; Hsu, Chien-Yeh; Chiu, Hung-Wen

    2017-04-27

    Empowering personal health records (PHRs) provides basic human right, awareness, and intention for health promotion. As health care delivery changes toward patient-centered services, PHRs become an indispensable platform for consumers and providers. Recently, the government introduced "My health bank," a Web-based electronic medical records (EMRs) repository for consumers. However, it is not yet a PHR. To date, we do not have a platform that can let patients manage their own PHR. This study creates a vision of a value-added platform for personal health data analysis and manages their health record based on the contents of the "My health bank." This study aimed to examine consumer expectation regarding PHR, using the importance-performance analysis. The purpose of this study was to explore consumer perception regarding this type of a platform: it would try to identify the key success factors and important aspects by using the importance-performance analysis, and give some suggestions for future development based on it. This is a cross-sectional study conducted in Taiwan. Web-based invitation to participate in this study was distributed through Facebook. Respondents were asked to watch an introductory movie regarding PHR before filling in the questionnaire. The questionnaire was focused on 2 aspects, including (1) system functions, and (2) system design and security and privacy. The questionnaire would employ 12 and 7 questions respectively. The questionnaire was designed following 5-points Likert scale ranging from 1 ("disagree strongly") to 5 ("Agree strongly"). Afterwards, the questionnaire data was sorted using IBM SPSS Statistics 21 for descriptive statistics and the importance-performance analysis. This research received 350 valid questionnaires. Most respondents were female (219 of 350 participants, 62.6%), 21-30 years old (238 of 350 participants, 68.0%), with a university degree (228 of 350 participants, 65.1%). They were still students (195 out of 350

  8. 42 CFR 495.370 - Appeals process for a Medicaid provider receiving electronic health record incentive payments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... & MEDICAID SERVICES, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES (CONTINUED) STANDARDS AND CERTIFICATION STANDARDS FOR THE ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORD TECHNOLOGY INCENTIVE PROGRAM Requirements Specific to the... provide that the provider (whether individual or entity) is also given any additional appeals rights that...

  9. Can personal health record booklets improve cancer screening behaviors?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Newell, Sallie Anne; Sanson-Fisher, Rob William; Girgis, Afaf; Davey, Heather Maree

    2002-01-01

    Despite the widespread use of written health education materials as interventions, relatively few studies have adequately evaluated the effectiveness of such materials on changing healthcare behaviors in the general population. The study consisted of ten matched pairs of small rural towns in New South Wales, Australia, with a total combined population of approximately 25,000 in both the intervention and control group towns. A randomized controlled trial was used. Personal Health Record Booklets (PHRBs) that include the latest evidence-based recommendations for reducing risk of cancer and cardiovascular disease were developed using leading behavioral change theories to maximize effectiveness. The booklets included an explanatory letter, a gender-specific Better Health Booklet, and a gender-specific Better Health Diary. Following a media campaign, the PHRBs were mailed to all residents aged 20 to 60 years (about 12,600 people) in the ten intervention towns. Family practitioners in the intervention towns were recruited to support and encourage people to use the PHRBs. Health Insurance Commission data for Papanicolaou (Pap) tests, mammograms, and skin operations were obtained for 5 years before the intervention, and 3 months and 1 year after the intervention. No significant increases in the rates of Pap tests, mammograms, and skin operations were detected in either short- or long-term follow-ups. While PHRBs may represent an inexpensive, easy-to-produce, and time-efficient method of communicating information to the general population, it appears unlikely that any significant behavioral change will result unless such materials are targeted toward high-risk groups or constitute the first intervention for a particular risk factor.

  10. A Framework for Evaluating the Software Product Quality of Pregnancy Monitoring Mobile Personal Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Idri, Ali; Bachiri, Mariam; Fernández-Alemán, José Luis

    2016-03-01

    Stakeholders' needs and expectations are identified by means of software quality requirements, which have an impact on software product quality. In this paper, we present a set of requirements for mobile personal health records (mPHRs) for pregnancy monitoring, which have been extracted from literature and existing mobile apps on the market. We also use the ISO/IEC 25030 standard to suggest the requirements that should be considered during the quality evaluation of these mPHRs. We then go on to design a checklist in which we contrast the mPHRs for pregnancy monitoring requirements with software product quality characteristics and sub-characteristics in order to calculate the impact of these requirements on software product quality, using the ISO/IEC 25010 software product quality standard. The results obtained show that the requirements related to the user's actions and the app's features have the most impact on the external sub-characteristics of the software product quality model. The only sub-characteristic affected by all the requirements is Appropriateness of Functional suitability. The characteristic Operability is affected by 95% of the requirements while the lowest degrees of impact were identified for Compatibility (15%) and Transferability (6%). Lastly, the degrees of the impact of the mPHRs for pregnancy monitoring requirements are discussed in order to provide appropriate recommendations for the developers and stakeholders of mPHRs for pregnancy monitoring.

  11. The Department of Energy`s Rocky Flats Plant: A guide to record series useful for health-related research. Volume I, introduction

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1995-08-01

    This guide consists of seven volumes which describe records useful for conducting health-related research at the DOE`s Rocky Flats Plant. Volume I is an introduction, and the remaining six volumes are arranged by the following categories: administrative and general, facilities and equipment, production and materials handling, waste management, workplace and environmental monitoring, and employee occupational exposure and health. Volume I briefly describes the Epidemiologic Records Project and provides information on the methodology used to inventory and describe the records series contained in subsequent volumes. Volume II describes records concerning administrative functions and general information. Volume III describes records series relating to the construction and routine maintenance of plant buildings and the purchase and installation of equipment. Volume IV describes records pertaining to the inventory and production of nuclear materials and weapon components. Records series include materials inventories, manufacturing specifications, engineering orders, transfer and shipment records, and War Reserve Bomb Books. Volume V describes records series pertaining to the storage, handling, treatment, and disposal of radioactive, chemical, or mixed materials produced or used at Rocky Flats. Volume VI describes records series pertaining to monitoring of the workplace and of the environment outside of buildings onsite and offsite. Volume VII describes records series pertaining to the health and occupational exposures of employees and visitors.

  12. The multilevel analysis of surface acting and mental health: A moderation of positive group affective tone

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lee, Meng-Shiu; Huang, Jui-Chan; Wu, Tzu-Jung

    2017-06-01

    The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship among surface acting, mental health, and positive group affective tone. According to the prior theory, this study attempts to establish a comprehensive research framework among these variables, and furthermore tests the moderating effect of positive group affective tone. Data were collected from 435 employees in 52 service industrial companies by questionnaire, and this study conducted multilevel analysis. The results showed that surface acting will negatively affect the mental health. In addition, the positive group affective tone have significant moderating effect on the relationship among surface acting and mental health. Finally, this study discusses managerial implications and highlights future research suggestions.

  13. Big data from electronic health records for early and late translational cardiovascular research: challenges and potential.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hemingway, Harry; Asselbergs, Folkert W; Danesh, John; Dobson, Richard; Maniadakis, Nikolaos; Maggioni, Aldo; van Thiel, Ghislaine J M; Cronin, Maureen; Brobert, Gunnar; Vardas, Panos; Anker, Stefan D; Grobbee, Diederick E; Denaxas, Spiros

    2018-04-21

    Cohorts of millions of people's health records, whole genome sequencing, imaging, sensor, societal and publicly available data present a rapidly expanding digital trace of health. We aimed to critically review, for the first time, the challenges and potential of big data across early and late stages of translational cardiovascular disease research. We sought exemplars based on literature reviews and expertise across the BigData@Heart Consortium. We identified formidable challenges including: data quality, knowing what data exist, the legal and ethical framework for their use, data sharing, building and maintaining public trust, developing standards for defining disease, developing tools for scalable, replicable science and equipping the clinical and scientific work force with new inter-disciplinary skills. Opportunities claimed for big health record data include: richer profiles of health and disease from birth to death and from the molecular to the societal scale; accelerated understanding of disease causation and progression, discovery of new mechanisms and treatment-relevant disease sub-phenotypes, understanding health and diseases in whole populations and whole health systems and returning actionable feedback loops to improve (and potentially disrupt) existing models of research and care, with greater efficiency. In early translational research we identified exemplars including: discovery of fundamental biological processes e.g. linking exome sequences to lifelong electronic health records (EHR) (e.g. human knockout experiments); drug development: genomic approaches to drug target validation; precision medicine: e.g. DNA integrated into hospital EHR for pre-emptive pharmacogenomics. In late translational research we identified exemplars including: learning health systems with outcome trials integrated into clinical care; citizen driven health with 24/7 multi-parameter patient monitoring to improve outcomes and population-based linkages of multiple EHR sources

  14. Recording routine forensic mental health evaluations should be a standard of practice in the 21st century.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Siegel, David M; Kinscherff, Robert

    2018-04-25

    The standard of practice for forensic interviews in criminal and delinquency cases, other than those conducted as part of brief preliminary screening evaluations or in emergency situations, should include a digital recording requirement. This standard should be adopted because of the greater availability of, and familiarity with, recording technology on the part of mental health professionals, the greater use and proven effectiveness of recording in other contexts of the criminal justice system, and the improvement in court presentation and accuracy of judicial determinations involving forensic assessments that recording will provide. The experience of practitioners with recording since professional associations last studied the issue should be taken into account, as informal data suggest it has been positive. Unfortunately, the legal system is unlikely to prompt this advance without its reconsideration by the forensic mental health professions, because current constitutional jurisprudence does not require recording and effectively makes it contingent upon request by examiners. Forensic evaluators thus have a valuable opportunity to educate the legal system on the utility and importance of this key reform, and so should adopt it as a best practice. Copyright © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  15. Patients’ Online Access to Their Primary Care Electronic Health Records and Linked Online Services: Implications for Research and Practice

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Freda Mold

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available Online access to medical records and linked services, including requesting repeat prescriptions and booking appointments, enables patients to personalize their access to care. However, online access creates opportunities and challenges for both health professionals and their patients, in practices and in research. The challenges for practice are the impact of online services on workload and the quality and safety of health care. Health professionals are concerned about the impact on workload, especially from email or other online enquiry systems, as well as risks to privacy. Patients report how online access provides a convenient means through which to access their health provider and may offer greater satisfaction if they get a timely response from a clinician. Online access and services may also result in unforeseen consequences and may change the nature of the patient-clinician interaction. Research challenges include: (1 Ensuring privacy, including how to control inappropriate carer and guardian access to medical records; (2 Whether online access to records improves patient safety and health outcomes; (3 Whether record access increases disparities across social classes and between genders; and (4 Improving efficiency. The challenges for practice are: (1 How to incorporate online access into clinical workflow; (2 The need for a business model to fund the additional time taken. Creating a sustainable business model for a safe, private, informative, more equitable online service is needed if online access to records is to be provided outside of pay-for-service systems.

  16. Exploring the influence of the Global Fund and the GAVI Alliance on health systems in conflict-affected countries.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Patel, Preeti; Cummings, Rachael; Roberts, Bayard

    2015-01-01

    Global Health Initiatives (GHIs) respond to high-impact communicable diseases in resource-poor countries, including health systems support, and are major actors in global health. GHIs could play an important role in countries affected by armed conflict given these countries commonly have weak health systems and a high burden of communicable disease. The aim of this study is to explore the influence of two leading GHIs, the Global Fund and the GAVI Alliance, on the health systems of conflict-affected countries. This study used an analytical review approach to identify evidence on the role of the Global Fund and the GAVI Alliance with regards to health systems support to 19 conflict-affected countries. Primary and secondary published and grey literature were used, including country evaluations from the Global Fund and the GAVI Alliance. The WHO heath systems building blocks framework was used for the analysis. There is a limited evidence-base on the influence of GHIs on health systems of conflict-affected countries. The findings suggest that GHIs are increasingly investing in conflict-affected countries which has helped to rapidly scale up health services, strengthen human resources, improve procurement, and develop guidelines and protocols. Negative influences include distorting priorities within the health system, inequitable financing of disease-specific services over other health services, diverting staff away from more essential health care services, inadequate attention to capacity building, burdensome reporting requirements, and limited flexibility and responsiveness to the contextual challenges of conflict-affected countries. There is some evidence of increasing engagement of the Global Fund and the GAVI Alliance with health systems in conflict-affected countries, but this engagement should be supported by more context-specific policies and approaches.

  17. Bridging the gap: a virtual health record for integrated home care

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Maria Hägglund

    2007-06-01

    Full Text Available Introduction: The coexistence of different information systems that are unable to communicate is a persistent problem in healthcare and in integrated home care in particular. Theory and methods: Physically federated integration is used for design of the underlying technical architecture to implement a mobile virtual health record for integrated home care. A user centered system development approach is followed during design and development of the system. Results: A technical platform based on a service-oriented approach where database functionality and services are separated has been developed. This guarantees flexibility with regard to changed functional demands and allows third party systems to interact with the platform in a standardized way. A physically federated integration enables point-of-care documentation, integrated presentation of information from different feeder systems, and offline access to data on handheld devices. Feeder systems deliver information in XML-files that are mapped against an ideal XML schema, published as an interface for integration with the information broker, and inserted into the mediator database. Conclusions: A seamless flow of information between both different care professionals involved in integrated home care and patients and relatives is provided through mobile information access and interaction with different feeder systems using the virtual health record.

  18. Understanding the patient perspective on research access to national health records databases for conduct of randomized registry trials.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Avram, Robert; Marquis-Gravel, Guillaume; Simard, François; Pacheco, Christine; Couture, Étienne; Tremblay-Gravel, Maxime; Desplantie, Olivier; Malhamé, Isabelle; Bibas, Lior; Mansour, Samer; Parent, Marie-Claude; Farand, Paul; Harvey, Luc; Lessard, Marie-Gabrielle; Ly, Hung; Liu, Geoffrey; Hay, Annette E; Marc Jolicoeur, E

    2018-07-01

    Use of health administrative databases is proposed for screening and monitoring of participants in randomized registry trials. However, access to these databases raises privacy concerns. We assessed patient's preferences regarding use of personal information to link their research records with national health databases, as part of a hypothetical randomized registry trial. Cardiology patients were invited to complete an anonymous self-reported survey that ascertained preferences related to the concept of accessing government health databases for research, the type of personal identifiers to be shared and the type of follow-up preferred as participants in a hypothetical trial. A total of 590 responders completed the survey (90% response rate), the majority of which were Caucasians (90.4%), male (70.0%) with a median age of 65years (interquartile range, 8). The majority responders (80.3%) would grant researchers access to health administrative databases for screening and follow-up. To this end, responders endorsed the recording of their personal identifiers by researchers for future record linkage, including their name (90%), and health insurance number (83.9%), but fewer responders agreed with the recording of their social security number (61.4%, pgranting researchers access to the administrative databases (OR: 1.69, 95% confidence interval: 1.03-2.90; p=0.04). The majority of Cardiology patients surveyed were supportive of use of their personal identifiers to access administrative health databases and conduct long-term monitoring in the context of a randomized registry trial. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  19. Trust in government and support for governmental regulation: the case of electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Herian, Mitchel N; Shank, Nancy C; Abdel-Monem, Tarik L

    2014-12-01

    This paper presents results from a public engagement effort in Nebraska, USA, which measured public opinions about governmental involvement in encouraging the use of electronic health records (EHRs). We examine the role of trust in government in contributing to public support for government involvement in the development of EHR technologies. We hypothesize that trust in government will lead to support for federal and state governmental encouragement of the use of EHRs among doctors and insurance companies. Further, because individual experiences with health-care professionals will reduce perceptions of risk, we expect that support for governmental involvement will be tempered by greater personal experience with the health-care industry. Examining a small survey of individuals on the issue, we find general support for both of our hypotheses. The findings suggest that trust in government does have a positive relationship with support for government involvement in the policy domain, but that the frequency of personal experiences with health-care providers reduces the extent to which the public supports governmental involvement in the development of EHR technology. This inquiry contributes to our understanding of public attitudes towards government involvement in EHRs in the United States specifically and contributes to social science examining links between trust in government and support for governmental activity in the emerging policy domain regarding electronic health records systems. © 2012 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  20. Towards successful coordination of electronic health record based-referrals: a qualitative analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hysong, Sylvia J; Esquivel, Adol; Sittig, Dean F; Paul, Lindsey A; Espadas, Donna; Singh, Simran; Singh, Hardeep

    2011-07-27

    Successful subspecialty referrals require considerable coordination and interactive communication among the primary care provider (PCP), the subspecialist, and the patient, which may be challenging in the outpatient setting. Even when referrals are facilitated by electronic health records (EHRs) (i.e., e-referrals), lapses in patient follow-up might occur. Although compelling reasons exist why referral coordination should be improved, little is known about which elements of the complex referral coordination process should be targeted for improvement. Using Okhuysen & Bechky's coordination framework, this paper aims to understand the barriers, facilitators, and suggestions for improving communication and coordination of EHR-based referrals in an integrated healthcare system. We conducted a qualitative study to understand coordination breakdowns related to e-referrals in an integrated healthcare system and examined work-system factors that affect the timely receipt of subspecialty care. We conducted interviews with seven subject matter experts and six focus groups with a total of 30 PCPs and subspecialists at two tertiary care Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers. Using techniques from grounded theory and content analysis, we identified organizational themes that affected the referral process. Four themes emerged: lack of an institutional referral policy, lack of standardization in certain referral procedures, ambiguity in roles and responsibilities, and inadequate resources to adapt and respond to referral requests effectively. Marked differences in PCPs' and subspecialists' communication styles and individual mental models of the referral processes likely precluded the development of a shared mental model to facilitate coordination and successful referral completion. Notably, very few barriers related to the EHR were reported. Despite facilitating information transfer between PCPs and subspecialists, e-referrals remain prone to coordination

  1. Safer electronic health records safety assurance factors for EHR resilience

    CERN Document Server

    Sittig, Dean F

    2015-01-01

    This important volume provide a one-stop resource on the SAFER Guides along with the guides themselves and information on their use, development, and evaluation. The Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience (SAFER) guides, developed by the editors of this book, identify recommended practices to optimize the safety and safe use of electronic health records (EHRs). These guides are designed to help organizations self-assess the safety and effectiveness of their EHR implementations, identify specific areas of vulnerability, and change their cultures and practices to mitigate risks.This book pr

  2. Mental health and psychosocial wellbeing of Syrians affected by armed conflict.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hassan, G; Ventevogel, P; Jefee-Bahloul, H; Barkil-Oteo, A; Kirmayer, L J

    2016-04-01

    This paper is based on a report commissioned by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which aims to provide information on cultural aspects of mental health and psychosocial wellbeing relevant to care and support for Syrians affected by the crisis. This paper aims to inform mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) staff of the mental health and psychosocial wellbeing issues facing Syrians who are internally displaced and Syrian refugees. We conducted a systematic literature search designed to capture clinical, social science and general literature examining the mental health of the Syrian population. The main medical, psychological and social sciences databases (e.g. Medline, PubMed, PsycInfo) were searched (until July 2015) in Arabic, English and French language sources. This search was supplemented with web-based searches in Arabic, English and French media, and in assessment reports and evaluations, by nongovernmental organisations, intergovernmental organisations and agencies of the United Nations. This search strategy should not be taken as a comprehensive review of all issues related to MHPSS of Syrians as some unpublished reports and evaluations were not reviewed. Conflict affected Syrians may experience a wide range of mental health problems including (1) exacerbations of pre-existing mental disorders; (2) new problems caused by conflict related violence, displacement and multiple losses; as well as (3) issues related to adaptation to the post-emergency context, for example living conditions in the countries of refuge. Some populations are particularly vulnerable such as men and women survivors of sexual or gender based violence, children who have experienced violence and exploitation and Syrians who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or intersex. Several factors influence access to MHPSS services including language barriers, stigma associated with seeking mental health care and the power dynamics of the helping relationship. Trust

  3. Specialty pharmaceuticals care management in an integrated health care delivery system with electronic health records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Monroe, C Douglas; Chin, Karen Y

    2013-05-01

    The specialty pharmaceuticals market is expanding more rapidly than the traditional pharmaceuticals market. Specialty pharmacy operations have evolved to deliver selected medications and associated clinical services. The growing role of specialty drugs requires new approaches to managing the use of these drugs. The focus, expectations, and emphasis in specialty drug management in an integrated health care delivery system such as Kaiser Permanente (KP) can vary as compared with more conventional health care systems. The KP Specialty Pharmacy (KP-SP) serves KP members across the United States. This descriptive account addresses the impetus for specialty drug management within KP, the use of tools such as an electronic health record (EHR) system and process management software, the KP-SP approach for specialty pharmacy services, and the emphasis on quality measurement of services provided. Kaiser Permanente's integrated system enables KP-SP pharmacists to coordinate the provision of specialty drugs while monitoring laboratory values, physician visits, and most other relevant elements of the patient's therapy. Process management software facilitates the counseling of patients, promotion of adherence, and interventions to resolve clinical, logistic, or pharmacy benefit issues. The integrated EHR affords KP-SP pharmacists advantages for care management that should become available to more health care systems with broadened adoption of EHRs. The KP-SP experience may help to establish models for clinical pharmacy services as health care systems and information systems become more integrated.

  4. An electronic health record-enabled obesity database

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wood G

    2012-05-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background The effectiveness of weight loss therapies is commonly measured using body mass index and other obesity-related variables. Although these data are often stored in electronic health records (EHRs and potentially very accessible, few studies on obesity and weight loss have used data derived from EHRs. We developed processes for obtaining data from the EHR in order to construct a database on patients undergoing Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (RYGB surgery. Methods Clinical data obtained as part of standard of care in a bariatric surgery program at an integrated health delivery system were extracted from the EHR and deposited into a data warehouse. Data files were extracted, cleaned, and stored in research datasets. To illustrate the utility of the data, Kaplan-Meier analysis was used to estimate length of post-operative follow-up. Results Demographic, laboratory, medication, co-morbidity, and survey data were obtained from 2028 patients who had undergone RYGB at the same institution since 2004. Pre-and post-operative diagnostic and prescribing information were available on all patients, while survey laboratory data were available on a majority of patients. The number of patients with post-operative laboratory test results varied by test. Based on Kaplan-Meier estimates, over 74% of patients had post-operative weight data available at 4 years. Conclusion A variety of EHR-derived data related to obesity can be efficiently obtained and used to study important outcomes following RYGB.

  5. The Effect of Acute Exercise on Affect and Arousal in Inpatient Mental Health Consumers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stanton, Robert; Reaburn, Peter; Happell, Brenda

    2016-09-01

    Acute exercise performed at a self-selected intensity improves affect and may improve long-term adherence. Similarly, in people with severe depression, acute aerobic exercise performed at self-selected intensity improves affect and arousal. However, the relationship between changes in affect and arousal and perceived exercise intensity in people with mental illness has not been evaluated. Affect and arousal were assessed immediately prior to, and immediately following, a group exercise program performed at a self-selected intensity in 40 inpatient mental health consumers who received a diagnosis of anxiety or bipolar or depressive disorders. Exercise intensity was assessed immediately after exercise. Postexercise affect was significantly improved for people with bipolar and depressive disorders but not for people with anxiety disorders. For the group as a whole, results showed a significant curvilinear relationship between ratings of perceived exertion and postexercise affect. These data will inform the development and delivery of future exercise interventions for inpatient mental health consumers.

  6. Experiences of Healthcare Professionals to the Introduction in Sweden of a Public eHealth Service: Patients' Online Access to their Electronic Health Records.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ålander, Ture; Scandurra, Isabella

    2015-01-01

    Patients' increasing demands for medical information, the digitization of health records and the fast spread of Internet access form a basis of introducing new eHealth services. An international trend is to provide access for patients to health information of various kind. In Sweden, access by patients to their proper electronic health record (EHR) has been provided in a pilot county since November 2012. This eHealth service is controversial and criticism has arised from the clinical professions, mainly physicians. Two web surveys were conducted to discover whether the opinions of healthcare professionals differ; between staff that have had experience with patients accessing their own EHR and those who have no such expericence. Experienced nurses found the EHR more important for the patients and a better reform, compared to unexperienced nurses in the rest of the country. Similarly, physicians with their own experience had a more positive attitude compared to non-experienced physicians. The conclusion of this study is that healthcare professionals must be involved in the implementation of public eHealth services such as EHRs and that real experiences of the professionals should be better disseminated to their inexperienced peers.

  7. Design of a cluster-randomized trial of electronic health record-based tools to address overweight and obesity in primary care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baer, Heather J; Wee, Christina C; DeVito, Katerina; Orav, E John; Frolkis, Joseph P; Williams, Deborah H; Wright, Adam; Bates, David W

    2015-08-01

    Primary care providers often fail to identify patients who are overweight or obese or discuss weight management with them. Electronic health record-based tools may help providers with the assessment and management of overweight and obesity. We describe the design of a trial to examine the effectiveness of electronic health record-based tools for the assessment and management of overweight and obesity among adult primary care patients, as well as the challenges we encountered. We developed several new features within the electronic health record used by primary care practices affiliated with Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, MA. These features included (1) reminders to measure height and weight, (2) an alert asking providers to add overweight or obesity to the problem list, (3) reminders with tailored management recommendations, and (4) a Weight Management screen. We then conducted a pragmatic, cluster-randomized controlled trial in 12 primary care practices. We randomized 23 clinical teams ("clinics") within the practices to the intervention group (n = 11) or the control group (n = 12). The new features were activated only for clinics in the intervention group. The intervention was implemented in two phases: the height and weight reminders went live on 15 December 2011 (Phase 1), and all of the other features went live on 11 June 2012 (Phase 2). Study enrollment went from December 2011 through December 2012, and follow-up ended in December 2013. The primary outcomes were 6-month and 12-month weight change among adult patients with body mass index ≥25 who had a visit at one of the primary care clinics during Phase 2. Secondary outcome measures included the proportion of patients with a recorded body mass index in the electronic health record, the proportion of patients with body mass index ≥25 who had a diagnosis of overweight or obesity on the electronic health record problem list, and the proportion of patients with body mass index ≥25 who had

  8. Acceptability of a personally controlled health record in a community-based setting: implications for policy and design.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Weitzman, Elissa R; Kaci, Liljana; Mandl, Kenneth D

    2009-04-29

    Consumer-centered health information systems that address problems related to fragmented health records and disengaged and disempowered patients are needed, as are information systems that support public health monitoring and research. Personally controlled health records (PCHRs) represent one response to these needs. PCHRs are a special class of personal health records (PHRs) distinguished by the extent to which users control record access and contents. Recently launched PCHR platforms include Google Health, Microsoft's HealthVault, and the Dossia platform, based on Indivo. To understand the acceptability, early impacts, policy, and design requirements of PCHRs in a community-based setting. Observational and narrative data relating to acceptability, adoption, and use of a personally controlled health record were collected and analyzed within a formative evaluation of a PCHR demonstration. Subjects were affiliates of a managed care organization run by an urban university in the northeastern United States. Data were collected using focus groups, semi-structured individual interviews, and content review of email communications. Subjects included: n = 20 administrators, clinicians, and institutional stakeholders who participated in pre-deployment group or individual interviews; n = 52 community members who participated in usability testing and/or pre-deployment piloting; and n = 250 subjects who participated in the full demonstration of which n = 81 initiated email communications to troubleshoot problems or provide feedback. All data were formatted as narrative text and coded thematically by two independent analysts using a shared rubric of a priori defined major codes. Sub-themes were identified by analysts using an iterative inductive process. Themes were reviewed within and across research activities (ie, focus group, usability testing, email content review) and triangulated to identify patterns. Low levels of familiarity with PCHRs were found as were high

  9. How health behaviors relate to academic performance via affect: an intensive longitudinal study.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lavinia Flueckiger

    Full Text Available OBJECTIVE: This intensive longitudinal study examined how sleep and physical activity relate to university students' affect and academic performance during a stressful examination period. METHODS: On 32 consecutive days, 72 first-year students answered online questionnaires on their sleep quality, physical activity, positive and negative affect, learning goal achievement, and examination grades. First-year university students are particularly well-suited to test our hypotheses: They represent a relatively homogeneous population in a natural, but controlled setting, and simultaneously deal with similar stressors, such as examinations. Data were analyzed using multilevel structural equation models. RESULTS: Over the examination period, better average sleep quality but not physical activity predicted better learning goal achievement. Better learning goal achievement was associated with increased probability of passing all examinations. Relations of average sleep quality and average physical activity with learning goal achievement were mediated by experienced positive affect. In terms of day-to-day dynamics, on days with better sleep quality, participants reported better learning goal achievement. Day-to-day physical activity was not related to daily learning goal achievement. Daily positive and negative affect both mediated the effect of day-to-day sleep quality and physical activity on daily learning goal achievement. CONCLUSION: Health behaviors such as sleep quality and physical activity seem important for both academic performance and affect experience, an indicator of mental health, during a stressful examination period. These results are a first step toward a better understanding of between- and within-person variations in health behaviors, affect, and academic performance, and could inform prevention and intervention programs for university students.

  10. How health behaviors relate to academic performance via affect: an intensive longitudinal study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Flueckiger, Lavinia; Lieb, Roselind; Meyer, Andrea H; Mata, Jutta

    2014-01-01

    This intensive longitudinal study examined how sleep and physical activity relate to university students' affect and academic performance during a stressful examination period. On 32 consecutive days, 72 first-year students answered online questionnaires on their sleep quality, physical activity, positive and negative affect, learning goal achievement, and examination grades. First-year university students are particularly well-suited to test our hypotheses: They represent a relatively homogeneous population in a natural, but controlled setting, and simultaneously deal with similar stressors, such as examinations. Data were analyzed using multilevel structural equation models. Over the examination period, better average sleep quality but not physical activity predicted better learning goal achievement. Better learning goal achievement was associated with increased probability of passing all examinations. Relations of average sleep quality and average physical activity with learning goal achievement were mediated by experienced positive affect. In terms of day-to-day dynamics, on days with better sleep quality, participants reported better learning goal achievement. Day-to-day physical activity was not related to daily learning goal achievement. Daily positive and negative affect both mediated the effect of day-to-day sleep quality and physical activity on daily learning goal achievement. Health behaviors such as sleep quality and physical activity seem important for both academic performance and affect experience, an indicator of mental health, during a stressful examination period. These results are a first step toward a better understanding of between- and within-person variations in health behaviors, affect, and academic performance, and could inform prevention and intervention programs for university students.

  11. Introducing sexual orientation and gender identity into the electronic health record: one academic health center's experience.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Callahan, Edward J; Sitkin, Nicole; Ton, Hendry; Eidson-Ton, W Suzanne; Weckstein, Julie; Latimore, Darin

    2015-02-01

    Many U.S. populations experience significant health disparities. Increasing health care providers' awareness of and education about sexual orientation (SO) and gender identity (GI) diversity could help reduce health disparities among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) patients. The authors share the University of California, Davis, Health System's (UCDHS's) experience as it became the first U.S. academic health center to formally introduce patient SO/GI demographic data into its electronic health record (EHR) as a step toward reducing LGBT health disparities. Adding these data to the EHR initially met with resistance. The authors, members of the UCDHS Task Force for Inclusion of SO/GI in the EHR, viewed this resistance as an invitation to educate leaders, providers, and staff about LGBT health disparities and to expose providers to techniques for discussing SO/GI with patients. They describe the strategies they employed to effect institutional culture change, including involvement of senior leadership, key informant interviews, educational outreach via grand rounds and resident workshops, and creation of a patient safety net through inviting providers to self-identify as welcoming LGBT patients. The ongoing cultural change process has inspired spin-off projects contributing to an improved climate for LGBT individuals at UCDHS, including an employee organization supporting SO/GI diversity, support for and among LGBT medical learners through events and listservs, development and implementation of an LGBT health curriculum, and creation of peer navigator programs for LGBT patients with cancer. The authors reflect on lessons learned and on institutional pride in and commitment to providing quality care for LGBT patients.

  12. 77 FR 40619 - Announcement of Requirements and Registration for What's In Your Health Record Video Challenge

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-07-10

    ... benefit of being able to view what was in your record? iv. What did you, or your provider learn from... Information Technology, HHS. Award Approving Official: Lygeia Ricciardi, Director, Office of Consumer eHealth. ACTION: Notice. SUMMARY: The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC...

  13. Factors affecting utilization of university health services in a tertiary institution in South-West Nigeria.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Obiechina, G O; Ekenedo, G O

    2013-01-01

    Most university health services have extensive health infrastructures, for the provision of effective and efficient health services to the students. In this study, we have tried to determine student's perception of factors affecting their utilization. To determine students' perception of health care services provided in a tertiary institution and assess students' attitude towards utilization. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 540 respondents, comprising of 390 males and 150 females. A structured and self-administered questionnaire was the instrument used to collect data for the study, while data collected was analyzed using descriptive statistics of frequency count and percentage. High cost of drugs (72.0%), non availability of essential drugs (54.8%), time spent waiting for treatment (67.2%), inadequate referral services (81.7%), and satisfaction with services (60.6%) were considered by the respondents as factors affecting the utilization of university health services. Students-medical staff relationship and accessibility to health facility (77.6% and 74.3% respectively) were, however, not considered as factors that affect utilization of university health services. It is recommended that to improve utilization and cost of care, government should make necessary efforts to incorporate tertiary institution into National Health Insurance scheme so that students above the age of 18 years can benefit from free treatment.

  14. Factors affecting reproductive performance of dairy cows.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Coleman, D A; Thayne, W V; Dailey, R A

    1985-07-01

    We conducted two studies to determine how herd management practices and traits of individual cows affect performance of the herd and of the cow within a herd. Management practices, reproductive performance of the herd, and relationships between management and reproductive performance were characterized on 83 dairy farms with 7596 cows. Data included 21 management variables (e.g., facilities, herd health program, estrous detection program) and 8 performance variables obtained from Dairy Herd Improvement or unofficial records (e.g., size of herd, production, days open). Although varying among herds, annual average herd incidences of reproductive disorders and reproductive performance were similar to those reported. Managerial practices influenced incidences of retained placenta and uterine infection, days open of cows not bred and of all cows, services per conception, and percentages of herd open more than 100 days and culled for low production. Veterinarian was the most consistent variable influencing herd reproductive performance. Data also were collected from production and lifetime records of 2532 cows in 19 herds. Reproductive performance was affected by season of calving, production, maturity, and reproductive disorders. Several cows with extremely poor reproductive records were maintained.

  15. Implementation of computer-based patient records in primary care: the societal health economic effects.

    OpenAIRE

    Arias-Vimárlund, V.; Ljunggren, M.; Timpka, T.

    1996-01-01

    OBJECTIVE: Exploration of the societal health economic effects occurring during the first year after implementation of Computerised Patient Records (CPRs) at Primary Health Care (PHC) centres. DESIGN: Comparative case studies of practice processes and their consequences one year after CPR implementation, using the constant comparison method. Application of transaction-cost analyses at a societal level on the results. SETTING: Two urban PHC centres under a managed care contract in Ostergötland...

  16. Do Social Ties Affect Our Health? Exploring the Biology of Relationships

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Do Social Ties Affect Our Health? Exploring the Biology of Relationships En español Send us your comments ... neighbors, or others, social connections can influence our biology and well-being. Wide-ranging research suggests that ...

  17. Electronic Health Record Adoption as a Function of Success: Implications for Meaningful Use

    Science.gov (United States)

    Naser, Riyad J.

    2012-01-01

    Successful electronic health records (EHR) implementation has the potential to transform the entire care delivery process across the enterprise. However, the rate of EHR implementation and use among physicians has been slow. Different factors have been reported in the literature that may hinder adoption of EHR. Identifying and managing these…

  18. Lessons learned from a health record bank start-up.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yasnoff, W A; Shortliffe, E H

    2014-01-01

    This article is part of a Focus Theme of METHODS of Information in Medicine on Health Record Banking. In late summer 2010, an organization was formed in greater Phoenix, Arizona (USA), to introduce a health record bank (HRB) in that community. The effort was initiated after market research and was aimed at engaging 200,000 individuals as members in the first year (5% of the population). It was also intended to evaluate a business model that was based on early adoption by consumers and physicians followed by additional revenue streams related to incremental services and secondary uses of clinical data, always with specific permission from individual members, each of whom controlled all access to his or her own data. To report on the details of the HRB experience in Phoenix, to describe the sources of problems that were experienced, and to identify lessons that need to be considered in future HRB ventures. We describe staffing for the HRB effort, the computational platform that was developed, the approach to marketing, the engagement of practicing physicians, and the governance model that was developed to guide the HRB design and implementation. Despite efforts to engage the physician community, limited consumer advertising, and a carefully considered financial strategy, the experiment failed due to insufficient enrollment of individual members. It was discontinued in April 2011. Although the major problem with this HRB project was undercapitalization, we believe this effort demonstrated that basic HRB accounts should be free for members and that physician engagement and participation are key elements in constructing an effective marketing channel. Local community governance is essential for trust, and the included population must be large enough to provide sufficient revenues to sustain the resource in the long term.

  19. Do Wealth Shocks Affect Health? New Evidence from the Housing Boom.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fichera, Eleonora; Gathergood, John

    2016-11-01

    We exploit large exogenous changes in housing wealth to examine the impact of wealth gains and losses on individual health. In UK household, panel data house price increases, which endow owners with greater wealth, lower the likelihood of home owners exhibiting a range of non-chronic health conditions and improve their self-assessed health with no effect on their psychological health. These effects are not transitory and persist over a 10-year period. Using a range of fixed effects models, we provide robust evidence that these results are not biased by reverse causality or omitted factors. For owners' wealth gains affect labour supply and leisure choices indicating that house price increases allow individuals to reduce intensity of work with commensurate health benefits. © 2016 The Authors. Health Economics Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. © 2016 The Authors. Health Economics Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  20. Ethics and the electronic health record in dental school clinics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cederberg, Robert A; Valenza, John A

    2012-05-01

    Electronic health records (EHRs) are a major development in the practice of dentistry, and dental schools and dental curricula have benefitted from this technology. Patient data entry, storage, retrieval, transmission, and archiving have been streamlined, and the potential for teledentistry and improvement in epidemiological research is beginning to be realized. However, maintaining patient health information in an electronic form has also changed the environment in dental education, setting up potential ethical dilemmas for students and faculty members. The purpose of this article is to explore some of the ethical issues related to EHRs, the advantages and concerns related to the use of computers in the dental operatory, the impact of the EHR on the doctor-patient relationship, the introduction of web-based EHRs, the link between technology and ethics, and potential solutions for the management of ethical concerns related to EHRs in dental schools.