International journal of medical informatics
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Mobile communication technologies may reduce maternal health disparities related to cost, distance, and infrastructure. However, the ability of mHealth initiatives to accelerate maternal health goals requires in part that women with the greatest health needs have access to mobile phones. ⋯ As maternal mHealth strategies are increasingly utilized, more efforts are needed to improve women's access to mobile phones and minimize potential health inequities brought on by health systems and technological barriers in access to care.
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The development of Electronic Health Records (EHRs) forms an integral part of the information strategy for the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK, with the aim of facilitating health information exchange for patient care and secondary use, including research and healthcare planning. Implementing EHR systems requires an understanding of patient expectations for consent mechanisms and consideration of public awareness towards information sharing as might be made possible through integrated EHRs across primary and secondary health providers. ⋯ A large number of patients remain unaware of EHRs, while preference for implicit consent is stronger among those who report previous awareness. Differences in awareness levels and consent expectations between groups with different socio-demographic characteristics suggest that public education and information campaigns should target specific groups to increase public awareness and ensure meaningful informed consent mechanisms.
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To quantify the effect of a new continuous-care guideline (GL)-application engine, the Picard decision support system (DSS) engine, on the correctness and completeness of clinicians' decisions relative to an established clinical GL, and to assess the clinicians' attitudes towards a specific DSS. ⋯ A continuous-care GL-based DSS, such as the Picard DSS engine, has the potential to prevent most errors of omission by ensuring uniformly high quality of clinical decision making (relative to a GL-based norm), due to the increased adherence (i.e., completeness) to the GL, and most of the errors of commission that increase therapy costs, by reducing the rate of redundant actions. However, to prevent clinical errors of commission, the DSS needs to be accompanied by additional modules, such as automated control of the quality of the physician's actual actions.
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To determine dosing alert rates based on prescription order characteristics and identify prescription order risk factors for the occurrence of dosing alerts. ⋯ Certain types of prescription orders have a higher risk for causing dosing alerts than others. Patient age, medication class, route of administration, and the month of year can affect dosing alert rates. Design and customization efforts should focus on these medications and prescription order characteristics that increase the risk for dosing alerts.
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The aim of this study was to evaluate the inter- and intra-observer agreement in the initial diagnosis and classification by means of plain radiographs and CT scans of tibial plateau fractures photographed and sent via WhatsApp Messenger. ⋯ We found an excellent inter- and intra-observer agreement in the imaging assessment of tibial plateau fractures sent via WhatsApp Messenger. The authors now propose the systematic use of the application to facilitate faster documentation and obtaining the opinion of an experienced consultant when not on call. Finally, we think the use of the WhatsApp Messenger as an adjuvant tool could be broadened to other clinical centres to assess its viability in other skeletal and non-skeletal trauma situations.