Assessment of an enterprise employee portal using dashboard monitoring system: a case study

A portal is a browser-based application that provides a web platform for users to improve inter-department collaboration and customer service. Portals are classified either as internal facing portals or external public facing portals. This study addresses the problems facing an internal portal related to its contents, functions and usability and provides a list of essential contents and functions that it should include through integrating theories and industry best practices. The theory framework is based on literature review and the industry best practices are based on the analysis of a number of internal portals of companies used as case studies. These two were compared to develop an information mapping grid to identify gaps between theories and practices. A case company was used to uncover additional insights on employee portal content and functionalities through the analysis of actual and perceived user portal usage. The results were then compared using an information mapping grid to derive a set of content and functionalities to improve usability of an internal employee portal. Results of this study indicate that customization and personalization is an important feature of an employee portal, however, features pertaining to communication and collaboration support, search support, help system and employee self-services appear to be more important in practice. The information mapping grid derived, the data warehouse architecture developed and the Dashboard Monitoring systems created to assess usability of an employee portal are applicable to similar enterprises --Abstract, page iii

Superficial Parotidectomy: Are drains essential?

OBJECTIVES: This prospective randomized clinical trial was conducted to evaluate the necessity of drainage after superficial parotidectomy for benign parotid disorders. METHODS: From 2013-2015, all patients who underwent total superficial parotidectomy for benign parotid disorders were randomly allocated to be drained or not, post-operatively. Operative and postoperative outcomes including complications (seroma, hematoma), necessity for aspiration of seroma, re-suturing and hospital stay were all assessed. The sample size was ascertained to be 50 in each arm and the allocation was on the basis of computer generated opaque envelopes. RESULTS: 25 patients were in the drain arm while 17 had no drain placed. The Incidence of seroma was analyzed on the basis of ITT and per protocol analysis. We found a statistically significant increased incidence of seroma formation, needing repeated aspiration in the patients with no drains. We analyzed various other factors such as operating time, the HPE report, and size of specimen and found no statistical correlation with the formation of seroma. CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that postoperative complications are increased when postoperative drainage is not done following superficial parotidectomy. In the light of these findings, the routine use of drains is recommended following parotid surgeries