Theoretical, Methodological and Practical Challenges in Designing Formative Evaluations of Personal eHealth Tools

This article describes the challenges experienced in designing a formative evaluation of a mobile personal eHealth tool for disease symptom tracking, in the context of Inflammatory Bowel Diseases management. As this unique context is characterized by regular visits with physicians, and the need to report disease activity to the physician, a mixed methodology is used to assess the fit of the technology to the context, and a multilevel model is used to evaluate theoretical links between patient and physician. Other issues include selection of sampling techniques, recruitment, and preventing study attrition by participants

Enhancing Patient Physician Communication with Electronic Symptom Reporting (ESR): A Multilevel Model

This article describes the development of a multilevel theoretical model, which explains electronic symptom reporting (ESR) in the context of chronic disease management. ESR entails the use of patient-held technologies, such as electronic personal health records (ePHRs), for recording patient symptom data so that the information can be transmitted to a physician for interpretation. As patient recall of symptoms is critical to treatment effectiveness, ESR offers several advantages over traditional symptom reporting methods. The patient has the ability to conveniently collect symptom data, which can subsequently be viewed by the physician in an interpretable and relevant manner. This article proposes a theoretical model, which integrates the perspectives of both patient and physician, in order to inform theory development in this area

RCQ: Inter-Clinician Relationships, Practice Audit and Communities of Practice for Healthcare Quality Improvement

Inter-clinician relationships and communities of practice have the ability to support continuous quality improvement efforts within healthcare organizations, by offering a means of sharing necessary knowledge that is generally not possessed by clinicians. Sustained adherence to the processes critical to quality improvement is necessary for durable improvements in quality, and knowledge sharing is necessary for supporting these skills, such as practice audit, change management and use of the associated technology. This paper unveils the RCQ (Relationships, Communities, Quality) model, which provides a framework for the purpose of sustaining practice audit for quality improvement in healthcare

Perceived Usefulness and Behavioral Intention to Use Consumer-Oriented Web-Based Health Tools: A Meta-Analysis

This meta-analysis reports on the predictive power of a portion of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), when used to evaluate web-based tools geared towards consumers of healthcare. Findings show that perceived usefulness is a strong predictor of behavioral intention in consumers who use web-based tools for health purposes. Findings also show that users in the contexts of both mental health and wellness exhibit homogeneity, suggesting that these populations may be distinct in their perceptions and use of web-based health tools

Global Ranking of Management- and Clinical-centered E-health Journals

This study presents a ranking list of 35 management- and 28 clinical-centered e-health academic journals developed based on a survey of 398 active researchers from 46 countries. Among the management-centered journals, the researchers ranked Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association and Journal of Medical Internet Research as A+ journals; among the clinical-focused journals, they ranked BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making and IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics as A+ journals. We found that journal longevity (years in print) had an effect on ranking scores such that longer standing journals had an advantage over their more recent counterparts, but this effect was only moderately significant and did not guarantee a favorable ranking position. Various stakeholders may use this list to advance the state of the e-health discipline. There are both similarities and differences between the present ranking and the one developed earlier in 2010

Electronic Food and Exercise Diaries: Knowledge Gaps and Future Research

Electronic food and exercise diaries are increasingly popular, both on the Internet and mobile devices. These tools offer apotential low-cost solution to help control and manage weight in those who suffer from obesity, as well as reduce the strain ofobesity on the Canadian healthcare system. The body of knowledge for electronic food and exercise diaries, however, islacking as to their effectiveness and related issues. This paper presents several key issues pertaining to the use of theseapplications, as well as proposed research directions, in which theories integrated from different areas can address these gaps.These theories include those that address acceptance of technology, continuity of use, and ability to produce behavioralchange. Preliminary research results indicate that the diaries are effective in weight reduction, but issues associated withinitial adoption remain

Managing Digital Resources for Care Delivery to Underserved

Difficulties in delivering healthcare to underserved populations compel the need for responsiveness in the way healthcare is delivered. Using framework based on Capabilities and Service Dominant Logic, this research seeks to understand partnership-level capabilities related to community engagement, digital leadership, and data and IT governance when healthcare providers and social organizations partner to deliver healthcare using digital services in a culturally relevant manner. A multisite case study is proposed that seeks to develop high quality care model to Indigenous population in the northwestern Ontario region in Canada

The Role of Healthcare Informatics Competencies (HICs) and IT Capabilities for Service Innovation in Paramedicine

Paramedic services in the developed world face several problems, often manifesting in unavailability of ambulances, and other negative effects. Paramedic services are innovating with new service delivery models and technologies, yet the evidence that guides paramedic services in these processes is lacking. The purpose of this paper is to determine how paramedic services innovate, and how that innovation is influenced by technology in particular. This research integrates the Dynamic Capabilities, IT Capabilities and Health Informatics Competencies approaches in a multilevel model to understand this issue in a sample of Canadian paramedic services (n=43). The results suggest that paramedics with higher competencies related to identifying areas for technology understanding and application contribute to the ability of a paramedic service to respond to environmental changes. The relationship between IT and paramedic leadership, and the business expertise of the information technology staff also have an impact on the ability to change

The Expert Survey-Based Global Ranking of Management- and Clinical-Centered Health Informatics and IT Journals

The goal of this study is to develop an expert survey-based journal ranking for the Health Informatics & Information Technology (HIIT) field. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association and Journal of Medical Internet Research were ranked as top HIIT management-focused journals, and BMC Medical Informatics & Decision Making and IEEE Journal of Biomedical & Health Informatics were ranked as top HIIT clinical-focused journals. This ranking benefits academics who conduct research in this field because it allows them to direct their research to appropriate journals, convey their accomplishments to tenure and promotion committees, and experience other benefits

Link Between Sustainability and Industry 4.0: Trends, Challenges and New Perspectives

The increasing number of studies that underline the relationship between industry 4.0 and sustainability shows that sustainability is one of the pillars of smart factories. Through a bibliometric performance and network analysis (BPNA), this research describes the existing relationship between industry 4.0 and sustainability, the strategic themes from 2010 to March 2019, as well as the research gaps for proposing future work. With this goal in mind, 894 documents and 5621 keywords were included for bibliometric analysis, which were treated with the support of Science Mapping Analysis Software Tool (SciMAT). The bibliometric performance analysis presented the number of publications over time and the most productive journals. The strategic diagram shown 12 main research clusters, which were measured according to bibliometric indicators. Moreover, the network structure of each cluster was depicted, and the patterns found were discussed based on the documents associated to the network. Our findings show the scientific efforts are focused to enhance economic and environmental aspects and highlights a lack of effort relating the social sphere. Finally, the paper concludes the challenges, perspectives, and suggestions for the potential future work in the field of study relating to industry 4.0 and sustainability