Cultural Transformation in Health Care

Describes the role of organizational culture in healthcare organizations. Recommends strategies for innovative approaches to improve the overall performance of the U.S. healthcare system

Responsible research and innovation in science education: insights from evaluating the impact of using digital media and arts-based methods on RRI values

The European Commission policy approach of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is gaining momentum in European research planning and development as a strategy to align scientific and technological progress with socially desirable and acceptable ends. One of the RRI agendas is science education, aiming to foster future generations' acquisition of skills and values needed to engage in society responsibly. To this end, it is argued that RRI-based science education can benefit from more interdisciplinary methods such as those based on arts and digital technologies. However, the evidence existing on the impact of science education activities using digital media and arts-based methods on RRI values remains underexplored. This article comparatively reviews previous evidence on the evaluation of these activities, from primary to higher education, to examine whether and how RRI-related learning outcomes are evaluated and how these activities impact on students' learning. Forty academic publications were selected and its content analysed according to five RRI values: creative and critical thinking, engagement, inclusiveness, gender equality and integration of ethical issues. When evaluating the impact of digital and arts-based methods in science education activities, creative and critical thinking, engagement and partly inclusiveness are the RRI values mainly addressed. In contrast, gender equality and ethics integration are neglected. Digital-based methods seem to be more focused on students' questioning and inquiry skills, whereas those using arts often examine imagination, curiosity and autonomy. Differences in the evaluation focus between studies on digital media and those on arts partly explain differences in their impact on RRI values, but also result in non-documented outcomes and undermine their potential. Further developments in interdisciplinary approaches to science education following the RRI policy agenda should reinforce the design of the activities as well as procedural aspects of the evaluation research

Searching Data: A Review of Observational Data Retrieval Practices in Selected Disciplines

A cross-disciplinary examination of the user behaviours involved in seeking and evaluating data is surprisingly absent from the research data discussion. This review explores the data retrieval literature to identify commonalities in how users search for and evaluate observational research data. Two analytical frameworks rooted in information retrieval and science technology studies are used to identify key similarities in practices as a first step toward developing a model describing data retrieval

Curriculum renewal for interprofessional education in health

In this preface we comment on four matters that we think bode well for the future of interprofessional education in Australia. First, there is a growing articulation, nationally and globally, as to the importance of interprofessional education and its contribution to the development of interprofessional and collaborative health practices. These practices are increasingly recognised as central to delivering effective, efficient, safe and sustainable health services. Second, there is a rapidly growing interest and institutional engagement with interprofessional education as part of pre-registration health professional education. This has changed substantially in recent years. Whilst beyond the scope of our current studies, the need for similar developments in continuing professional development (CPD) for health professionals was a consistent topic in our stakeholder consultations. Third, we observe what might be termed a threshold effect occurring in the area of interprofessional education. Projects that address matters relating to IPE are now far more numerous, visible and discussed in terms of their aggregate outcomes. The impact of this momentum is visible across the higher education sector. Finally, we believe that effective collaboration is a critical mediating process through which the rich resources of disciplinary knowledge and capability are joined to add value to existing health service provision. We trust the conceptual and practical contributions and resources presented and discussed in this report contribute to these developments.Office of Learning and Teaching Australi

Application of Natural Language Processing to Determine User Satisfaction in Public Services

Research on customer satisfaction has increased substantially in recent years. However, the relative importance and relationships between different determinants of satisfaction remains uncertain. Moreover, quantitative studies to date tend to test for significance of pre-determined factors thought to have an influence with no scalable means to identify other causes of user satisfaction. The gaps in knowledge make it difficult to use available knowledge on user preference for public service improvement. Meanwhile, digital technology development has enabled new methods to collect user feedback, for example through online forums where users can comment freely on their experience. New tools are needed to analyze large volumes of such feedback. Use of topic models is proposed as a feasible solution to aggregate open-ended user opinions that can be easily deployed in the public sector. Generated insights can contribute to a more inclusive decision-making process in public service provision. This novel methodological approach is applied to a case of service reviews of publicly-funded primary care practices in England. Findings from the analysis of 145,000 reviews covering almost 7,700 primary care centers indicate that the quality of interactions with staff and bureaucratic exigencies are the key issues driving user satisfaction across England

Include 2011 : The role of inclusive design in making social innovation happen.

Include is the biennial conference held at the RCA and hosted by the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design. The event is directed by Jo-Anne Bichard and attracts an international delegation

Building knowledge repositories with enterprise modelling and patterns – from theory to practice

An approach to building knowledge repositories, Enterprise Knowledge Patterns (EKP), has been developed and applied throughout a number of research projects, most recently in the ELEKTRA, HyperKnowledge1 and EKLär projects. The EKP approach combines Enterprise Modelling with organisational patterns. Systematic evaluations of applying the approach have been carried out in two of the projects, while the third project is currently running. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the evaluation results and to share practical experiences from building knowledge repositories with Enterprise Modelling and organisational patterns. We discuss issues concerning the knowledge content of pattern based knowledge repositories, the language used to express knowledge in organisational patterns and technology support for storing and retrieving knowledge components.

Human computer interaction for international development: past present and future

Recent years have seen a burgeoning interest in research into the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the context of developing regions, particularly into how such ICTs might be appropriately designed to meet the unique user and infrastructural requirements that we encounter in these cross-cultural environments. This emerging field, known to some as HCI4D, is the product of a diverse set of origins. As such, it can often be difficult to navigate prior work, and/or to piece together a broad picture of what the field looks like as a whole. In this paper, we aim to contextualize HCI4D—to give it some historical background, to review its existing literature spanning a number of research traditions, to discuss some of its key issues arising from the work done so far, and to suggest some major research objectives for the future

Improving quality of summative eHealth evaluations

Summative evaluation, which is conducted at the end of an eHealth trial or implementation,assesses outcomes, produces evidence, and advances knowledge of eHealth implementationsin healthcare provisions. Therefore, its high quality is essential in order to reap the benefits ofthe results generated by evaluation studies. Quality is achieved in eHealth evaluation throughcontextual sensitivity, adequate research design, adherence to standards, a mixed-methodresearch approach, and ethical handling of data. However, insufficient quality in eHealthevaluation studies leads to decision makers and other potential users disregarding their results,which leads to the resources and effort involved in conducting an evaluation being wasted.The purpose of this thesis is to study how summative eHealth evaluations can be improved tosupport the determination of eHealth value in a specific context as well as the use of evidenceproduced during eHealth interventions. This thesis is built on a single case study of a summativeeHealth evaluation of an eHealth implementation project within different healthcare contexts.The thesis focuses on the different phases of evaluation process, assesses adequacy of standards,explores value that the eHealth intervention delivered in different contexts, and studies howevidence from evaluation is further used.The thesis extends knowledge on eHealth evaluation quality by providing deeper insights intothe problems in the existing quality criteria and by introducing two new criteria for quality ineHealth evaluations: capturing value of an eHealth solution and involving healthcareprofessionals in the intervention and its evaluation. The thesis reveals that meeting some of thecriteria is not always practical, and that evaluators might make trade-offs among the criteria.The findings point to a need to improve methodologies for eHealth evaluations by providingbetter guidance to evaluators and validating evaluation standards in different locations. Thethesis also suggests viewing value of an eHealth solution as a holistic view of the createdmonetary and nonmonetary benefits of eHealth that require monetary and nonmonetarysacrifices in a particular context. In addition, the thesis proposes a model for assessing value ofan eHealth solution

Social recognition provision patterns in professional Q&A forums in Healthcare and Construction

© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. For some decades, professional Q&A forums have been used as a mainstream way of sharing practices between novices and experts. Several forums have had time to develop their own communities and habits, which made them a suitable place to explore patterned epistemic practices. In this paper we look at the social recognition, help seeking and informal learning patterns in communities of practice; our aim is to use the corresponding outputs to scaffold technology supported informal learning. We analyzed professional discussion forums in two countries (UK and Germany) in two different sectors (Healthcare and Construction). We identified a set of interrelated patterns that are used for socially verifying and maturing rules and guidelines, solving problems, introducing new practices and triggering learning. Some particular social recognition and learning trends common in Healthcare and Construction sector Q&A forums are highlighted. We discuss epistemic practice pattern networks for developing scaffolds to enhance the quality of informal learning in workplace environments in an integrated way. We suggest and validate empirically a model of social recognition provision in Q&A forums