Re-thinking technology and its growing role in enabling patient empowerment

© The Author(s) 2018. The presence and increase of challenges to eHealth in today’s society have begun to generate doubts about the capability of technology in patient empowerment, especially within the frameworks supporting empowerment. Through the review of existing frameworks and articulation of patient demands, weaknesses in the current application of technology to support empowerment are explored, and key constituents of a technology-driven framework for patient empowerment are determined. This article argues that existing usage of technology in the design, development and implementation of patient empowerment in the healthcare system, although well intentioned, is insufficiently constituted, primarily as a result of fragmentation. Systems theory concepts such as holism and iteration are considered vital in improving the role of technology in enabling patient empowerment

Information and communication technologies and patient empowerment: A complex skein

This article aims to explore the relationship between patient empowerment and information and communication technologies (ICTs). Indeed, ICTs are considered important for increasing access to medical information and for patients\u2019 other experiences, thereby nourishing the empowering rhetoric. The paper presents a research study conducted in Italy that focuses on the self-assessments made by online health communities (OHCs) users, subdivided in three categories, according to their level of online activity: Lurkers, occasionally active users and frequently active users. The concept of empowerment was operationalised in five issues: autonomy from doctors, involvement in medical decision-making, competence, self-management and acceptance. The results support the relationship between perceptions of empowerment and the higher level of activity played on OHCs, contributing instead to reject the idea of a generalised benefit. Moreover, the paper aims to enrich the theory of patient empowerment by adding a socio-material perspective. This helps broaden the understanding of the relationship between empowerment and ICTs by highlighting its underlying complex skein

Improving Nutrition Literacy in Primary Care

Abstract By the year 2030, nearly one in every two adults will have obesity (Body Mass Index [BMI] ≥30 kg/m2.), and one in four adults will have severe obesity (BMI ≥35 kg/m2) (Ward et al., 2019). Equally troubling is that obesity poses a threat to the health of individuals, decreases the quality of life, shortens life expectancy, causes and worsens comorbidities, and increases all- cause mortality (Abdelaal et al., 2017). Studies have shown a link between BMI, nutritional knowledge, and dietary practices. Nutrition literacy is a newer term that refers to the complex relationship between nutrition knowledge, dietary behavior, and necessary skills. Nutrition literacy is critical to preventing and reversing obesity and needs to be studied. Primary care is an opportune place to address nutrition literacy. This project aimed to investigate the efficacy of delivering digital nutritional education. A pre- and post-questionnaire design was used to measure nutrition literacy in adults with a BMI ≥26 kg/m2 before and immediately after providing the educational intervention. A sample size of 16 adults participated. The intervention group (n = 8) gained nutrition literacy by 8.6% with a confidence interval of 95%. The outcomes from this evaluation project suggest that nutrition literacy in patients with a BMI ≥26 kg/m2 can be improved with web-based nutritional education. Key Words: obesity, nutrition knowledge, dietary behaviors, nutrition literacy, digital learning, nutrition education, primary car

Perceptions of health professionals using the Umbiflow portable continuous wave doppler in two (2) urban hospitals in South Africa

Master of Public Health - MPHSouth Africa had a stillbirth rate of 16.4/1000 in 2019. Umbiflow is a sophisticated portable continuous wave Doppler device with bidirectional indication of blood flow velocity in the umbilical cord. Umbiflow clinical trial results have indicated that several stillbirths were avoided by screening pregnant women classed as low risk. The study aimed to describe the perceptions of health professionals on the Umbiflow screening tool. The objectives were to explore the health professionals’ perceptions on the usability, acceptability and the perceived challenges with implementation of Umbiflo

Hybridizing the health education component of healthcare

This disquisition employed a “dissertation in practice” (Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate, 2021) model, wherein scholar-practitioners in EdD programs lead an organizational improvement initiative that seeks to address an equity-oriented problem of practice. For this disquisition, two interrelated problems were addressed. Problem one (framed as an institutional problem) is related to the suboptimal value offered by the healthcare system in the United States (U.S.). Problem two, (framed as a human problem), explores the lack of access provided to migrant and seasonal agricultural workers (MSAW) to preventative musculoskeletal (MSK) health education. This disquisition suggests that the value of healthcare, defined simply by Porter and Teisberg (2006) as health outcomes per dollar spent, and access to valuable health education could be improved in the U.S. and beyond by systemizing the delivery of health education in a hybridized manner that combines traditional face-to-face (FtF) delivery with digital and electronic mediums. The improvement initiative included the use of a learning management system (LMS) to disseminate the health education/courses intended for MSAW and other stakeholders involved in agricultural health. To explore the effectiveness of the LMS toward increased healthcare access and value, formative and summative data were collected through post course surveys, pretest/posttest assessment of learning, course utilization analytics built into the LMS, and semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders in agricultural health. Implications of the initiative in the global context include the potential to improve the value of healthcare through more effective health education and better health outcomes at lower costs. Implications in the context of MSAW MSK health include the potential to improve (a) knowledge and confidence related to prevention and self-care of musculoskeletal health conditions common in agriculture, (b) access to, awareness of, and utilization of evidence-informed health education that emphasizes prevention and self-care related to musculoskeletal health issues associated with agricultural work, and (c) the value of health education estimated by learning outcomes and learner perceptions

Usability analysis of contending electronic health record systems

In this paper, we report measured usability of two leading EHR systems during procurement. A total of 18 users participated in paired-usability testing of three scenarios: ordering and managing medications by an outpatient physician, medicine administration by an inpatient nurse and scheduling of appointments by nursing staff. Data for audio, screen capture, satisfaction rating, task success and errors made was collected during testing. We found a clear difference between the systems for percentage of successfully completed tasks, two different satisfaction measures and perceived learnability when looking at the results over all scenarios. We conclude that usability should be evaluated during procurement and the difference in usability between systems could be revealed even with fewer measures than were used in our study. © 2019 American Psychological Association Inc. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe