Evaluating the Health Information Technology Regional Extension Center in South Carolina

ObjectiveTo determine the impact of the South Carolina Regional Extension Center, Center for Information Technology Implementation Assistance (CITIA-SC), on physician practices engaged in the process of electronic medical record (EMR) adoption.Data sourcesData from a cross-sectional survey distributed in March 2011 to 1310 primary care practice groups throughout South Carolina was used to determine the degree of EMR adoption throughout the state (n=452 respondents; 34.5% response rate). Participation in CITIA-SC was determined by obtaining a list of practices from CITIA-SC.Study designA posttest-only design with nonequivalent groups was used to estimate the degree of EMR implementation, plans for and perceived barriers to implementation based on CITIA-SC participation.ResultsCITIA-SC practice sites faced similar barriers to EMR implementation as non-CITIA-SC participants, including initial or recurring cost of an EMR, low staff expertise with EMRs or computers, and productivity disruption. Additionally, CITIA-SC practice sites had fewer IT personnel on staff (p=0.0358) and were considering EMR implementation without a plan (p=0.0125). Despite these barriers, more practices participating in the CITIA-SC program were preparing to invest in an EMR system within one year when compared to nonparticipants (75.9% versus 28.3%, p<0.0001).ConclusionOur results indicated that the practice sites that participate in the REC had fewer IT resources and more perceived barriers to implementation. These results suggest that REC participant practice sites intend to implement an EMR, but recognize the need for technical assistance in the preparation and implementation of an EMR system.     

从中美电子病历标准的比较看中国电子病历标准的发展和完善

在借鉴美国电子病历标准基础上,对中美电子病历标准化的发展历史、现状和内容等进行分析比较,找出我国电子病历标准化存在的问题和解决方案,使我国的电子病历标准建设更加健康和规范。     

Longitudinal outcomes of using a fluoride performance measure for adults at high risk of experiencing caries

BackgroundStaff of the VA Office of Dentistry, the dental care arm of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs' Veterans Health Administration, developed a performance measure (PM) regarding appropriate fluoride use. The authors hypothesized that after the implementation of this PM, veterans at high risk of experiencing caries would require fewer new dental restorations than in the past.MethodsIn a retrospective longitudinal analysis, the authors evaluated the effectiveness of a PM in reducing restoration rates in veterans at high risk of experiencing caries. They evaluated changes in restoration rates for all eligible veterans, as well as the subpopulation at high risk of experiencing caries (defined as receiving two or more restorations in 12 months) both before and after the implementation of the PM.ResultsIn 2012, 81 percent of clinics provided fluoride for more than 90 percent of their patients at high risk of experiencing caries. After use of the PM for four years, there were 8.6 percent fewer patients needing two or more restorations, a 10.8 percent decrease in the mean number of restorations and a modest 3.4 percent fewer patients at high risk of experiencing caries who required new restorations after the initial 12-month period.ConclusionsFluoride use for patients at high risk of experiencing caries rose from 51.8 percent in 2008 to 93.6 percent in 2012. Restoration rates rose before implementation of the PM and fell consistently after its implementation.Practical ImplicationsFluoride use reduces the need for future restorations in adults at high risk of experiencing caries.     

Relational machine learning for electronic health record-driven phenotyping

ObjectiveElectronic health records (EHR) offer medical and pharmacogenomics research unprecedented opportunities to identify and classify patients at risk. EHRs are collections of highly inter-dependent records that include biological, anatomical, physiological, and behavioral observations. They comprise a patient’s clinical phenome, where each patient has thousands of date-stamped records distributed across many relational tables. Development of EHR computer-based phenotyping algorithms require time and medical insight from clinical experts, who most often can only review a small patient subset representative of the total EHR records, to identify phenotype features. In this research we evaluate whether relational machine learning (ML) using inductive logic programming (ILP) can contribute to addressing these issues as a viable approach for EHR-based phenotyping.MethodsTwo relational learning ILP approaches and three well-known WEKA (Waikato Environment for Knowledge Analysis) implementations of non-relational approaches (PART, J48, and JRIP) were used to develop models for nine phenotypes. International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision (ICD-9) coded EHR data were used to select training cohorts for the development of each phenotypic model. Accuracy, precision, recall, F-Measure, and Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristic (AUROC) curve statistics were measured for each phenotypic model based on independent manually verified test cohorts. A two-sided binomial distribution test (sign test) compared the five ML approaches across phenotypes for statistical significance.ResultsWe developed an approach to automatically label training examples using ICD-9 diagnosis codes for the ML approaches being evaluated. Nine phenotypic models for each ML approach were evaluated, resulting in better overall model performance in AUROC using ILP when compared to PART (p = 0.039), J48 (p = 0.003) and JRIP (p = 0.003).DiscussionILP has the potential to improve phenotyping by independently delivering clinically expert interpretable rules for phenotype definitions, or intuitive phenotypes to assist experts.ConclusionRelational learning using ILP offers a viable approach to EHR-driven phenotyping.     

Does long time spending on the electronic devices affect the reading abilities? A cross-sectional study among Chinese school-aged children

Home literacy environment (HLE) is one of most important modifiable risk factors to dyslexia. With the development in technology, we include the electronic devices usage at home, such as computers and televisions, to the definition of HLE and investigate its impact on dyslexia based on the on-going project of Tongji's Reading Environment and Dyslexia Study. The data include 5063 children, primary school students (grade 3–grade 6), from a middle-sized city in China. We apply the principal component analysis (PCA) to reduce the large dimension of variables in HLE, and find the first three components, denoted as PC1, PC2 and PC3, can explain 95.45% of HLE information. PC1 and PC2 demonstrate strong positive association with ‘total time spending on electronic devices’ and ‘literacy-related activity’, respectively. PC3 demonstrates strong negative association with ‘restrictions on using electronic devices’. From the generalized linear model, we find that PC1 significantly increases the risk of dyslexia (OR = 1.043, 95% CI: 1.018–1.070), while PC2 significantly decreases the risk of dyslexia (OR = 0.839, 95% CI: 0.795–0.886). Therefore, reducing the total time spending on electronic devices and increasing the literacy-related activity would be the potential protective factors for dyslexic children in China.     

短时间重复测量血压的波动规律研究

目的 分析血压在短时间内重复测量中的波动规律,比较汞柱式血压计和全自动电子血压计波动规律的差异.方法 利用Y型三通技术,用汞柱式血压计与电子血压计(OMRON HEM-770A)同步测量85名受试者,以汞柱血压作为参考血压分析间隔1～2 min三次测量结果的波动规律,并与电子血压进行比较.结果 三次测量所得参考血压存在规律波动,第二次比第一次平均低3.5/1.8 mm Hg;第三次比第二次低1.8/0.8 mm Hg,后两次的血压波动趋于平稳.与第一次比较,第二次测量95%的个体收缩压波动在-16～9 mm Hg之内,舒张压在-12～8 mm Hg之内;与第二次比较,第三次测量95%的个体收缩压波动在-14～11 mm Hg之内,舒张压在-8～6 mm Hg之内.电子血压计各次读数间也存在相似波动或偏移.结论 人的血压可存在超过10 mm Hg的瞬时波动,电子血压计能较好的记录血压的瞬时变化,不能因两次测量读数不同而轻易怀疑血压计的稳定性.     

OR Department: Challenging New Study Made of Traditional O.R. Practices

The ability of nurses to adopt and successfully use EMR is expected to have a significant impact on achieving benefits such as reduction in healthcare costs and improvement in healthcare quality. A review of the current research literature reveals issues and concerns relating to the adoption and use of EMR by nurses in hospital environments. This article presents a literature review of such issues and concerns, and suggests a framework for enhancing the adoption and use of EMR by nurses and hospitals.     

Impact of the HITECH financial incentives on EHR adoption in small,physician-owned practices

BackgroundPhysicians in small physician-owned practices in the United States have been slower to adopt EHRs than physicians in large practices or practices owned by large organizations. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 included provisions intended to address many of the potential barriers to EHR adoption cited in the literature, including a financial incentives program that has paid physicians and other professionals $13 billion through December 2015.ObjectiveGiven the range of factors that may be influencing physicians’ decisions on whether to adopt an EHR, and given the level of HITECH expenditures to date, there is significant policy value in assessing whether the HITECH incentives have actually had an impact on EHR adoption decisions among U.S. physicians in small, physician-owned practices. This study addresses this question by analyzing physicians’ own views on the influence of the HITECH incentives as well as other potential considerations in their decision-making on whether to adopt an EHR.MethodsUsing data from a national survey of physicians, five composite scales were created from groups of survey items to reflect physician views on different potential facilitators and barriers for EHR adoption as of 2011, after the launch of the HITECH incentives program. Multinomial and binary logistic regression models were specified to test which of these physician-reported considerations have a significant relationship with EHR adoption status among 1043 physicians working in physician-owned practices with no more than 10 physicians.ResultsPhysicians’ views on the importance of the HITECH financial incentives are strongly associated with EHR adoption during the first three years of the HITECH period (2010–2012). In the study’s primary model, a one-point increase on a three-point scale for physician-reported influence of the HITECH financial incentives increases the relative risk of being in the process of adoption in 2011, compared to the risk of remaining a non-adopter, by a factor of 4.02 (p < 0.001, 95% CI of 2.06–7.85). In a second model which excludes pre-HITECH adopters from the data, a one-point increase on the incentives scale increases the relative risk of having become a new EHR user in 2010 or 2011, compared to the risk of remaining a non-adopter, by a factor of 3.98 (p < 0.01, 95% CI of 1.48–10.68) and also increases the relative risk of being in the process of adoption in 2011 by a factor of 5.73 (p < 0.001, 95% CI of 2.57–12.76), compared to the risk of remaining a non-adopter in 2011. In contrast, a composite scale that reflects whether physicians viewed choosing a specific EHR vendor as challenging is not associated with adoption status.ConclusionsThis study’s principal finding is that the HITECH financial incentives were influential in accelerating EHR adoption among small, physician-owned practices in the United States. A second finding is that physician decision-making on EHR adoption in the United States has not matched what would be predicted by the literature on network effects. The market’s failure to converge on a dominant design in the absence of interoperability means it will be difficult to achieve widespread exchange of patients’ clinical information among different health care provider organizations.     

A multidisciplinary approach to designing and evaluating Electronic Medical Record portal messages that support patient self-care

We describe a project intended to improve the use of Electronic Medical Record (EMR) patient portal information by older adults with diverse numeracy and literacy abilities, so that portals can better support patient-centered care. Patient portals are intended to bridge patients and providers by ensuring patients have continuous access to their health information and services. However, they are underutilized, especially by older adults with low health literacy, because they often function more as information repositories than as tools to engage patients. We outline an interdisciplinary approach to designing and evaluating portal-based messages that convey clinical test results so as to support patient-centered care. We first describe a theory-based framework for designing effective messages for patients. This involves analyzing shortcomings of the standard portal message format (presenting numerical test results with little context to guide comprehension) and developing verbally, graphically, video- and computer agent-based formats that enhance context. The framework encompasses theories from cognitive and behavioral science (health literacy, fuzzy trace memory, behavior change) as well as computational/engineering approaches (e.g., image and speech processing models). We then describe an approach to evaluating whether the formats improve comprehension of and responses to the messages about test results, focusing on our methods. The approach combines quantitative (e.g., response accuracy, Likert scale responses) and qualitative (interview) measures, as well as experimental and individual difference methods in order to investigate which formats are more effective, and whether some formats benefit some types of patients more than others. We also report the results of two pilot studies conducted as part of developing the message formats.