Abstract
Background: We developed a 6-month educational intervention addressing menopause and management of menopausal symptoms called “My HealtheVet to Enable And Negotiate for Shared decision-making” or MEANS. MEANS is offered through secure messaging via the My HealtheVet patient portal system.Materials and Methods: Women veterans aged 45–60 years registered at the Miami, West Palm Beach, and Orlando Veterans Affairs Healthcare Systems (VAHS). Intervention group: women in the Miami VAHS enrolled in My HealtheVet who were sent an invitation, agreed to participate, and completed the baseline survey. Comparison group: women from the Miami, West Palm Beach, and Orlando VAHS who responded to the baseline survey.Results: The intervention group enrolled 269 women at Miami VAHS: average age 53.2 years; 42.4% white, 43.1% black, and 24.2% Hispanic; 95.9% already used My Healthe Vet. The Comparison group had 590 women: average age 53.8 years; 70.8% white, 20.7% black, and 10.2% Hispanic; 57.6% already used My Healthe Vet.Conclusions: The differences between the intervention and comparison groups likely represent the regional demographic variations and the disparate recruitment techniques adopted for the two groups. Using within- and between-group comparisons at the end of the 6-month intervention, this novel project will evaluate the feasibility of a patient portal intervention on knowledge and shared decision-making regarding menopause among racially and ethnically diverse women. The study highlights the scalable and enormous potential for patient portals in nonurgent chronic disease management and shared decision-making, important in the existing health care climate, wherein “meaningful use” of electronic health records is mandated. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, medical care has abruptly changed to telehealth and this approach to patient education is more relevant now than ever before.This quality improvement project's registration number is ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT03109145.
Highlights
In North America, there are *30 million women in the menopausal age range between 40 and 54 years[1] and roughly 6,000 women reach menopause daily.[2]
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, medical care has abruptly changed to telehealth and this approach to patient education is more relevant than ever before
In the Miami Veterans Affairs Healthcare Systems (VAHS), using data from the electronic medical records, 2,080 women veterans were identified as potential participants, of which 1,166 (56%) had My HealtheVet and were contacted
Summary
In North America, there are *30 million women in the menopausal age range between 40 and 54 years[1] and roughly 6,000 women reach menopause daily.[2]. Materials and Methods: Women veterans aged 45–60 years registered at the Miami, West Palm Beach, and Orlando Veterans Affairs Healthcare Systems (VAHS). Intervention group: women in the Miami VAHS enrolled in My HealtheVet who were sent an invitation, agreed to participate, and completed the baseline survey. Comparison group: women from the Miami, West Palm Beach, and Orlando VAHS who responded to the baseline survey. Using within- and betweengroup comparisons at the end of the 6-month intervention, this novel project will evaluate the feasibility of a patient portal intervention on knowledge and shared decision-making regarding menopause among racially and ethnically diverse women. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, medical care has abruptly changed to telehealth and this approach to patient education is more relevant than ever before. This quality improvement project’s registration number is ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT03109145
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