Abstract
BackgroundHealthcare contexts are witnessing a growing use of applications to support clinical processes and to communicate between peers and with patients. An increasing number of hospital professionals use instant-messaging applications such as WhatsApp in their daily work. Previous research has mainly focused on the advantages and risks of WhatsApp usage in different clinical settings, but limited evidence is available about whether and how individual and organizational determinants can influence the use of WhatsApp in hospitals. Moreover, instruments to explore this phenomenon are lacking. A theoretical four-factor model based on the ‘Technology Acceptance Model’ and the Institutional Theory, guided the development of a new measure of the individual and institutional determinants of WhatsApp usage in hospitals.AimTo develop and psychometrically test the questionnaire ‘Digital Innovation Adoption in Hospitals’.MethodA panel of researchers and clinical experts generated an initial pool of 35 items by identifying and adapting items from existing measures. These items were assessed for content and face validity by fourteen experts. The final 28-item ‘Digital Innovation Adoption in Hospitals’ questionnaire comprising four sections (Perceived risks, Perceived usefulness, Regulative factors and Normative factors) was administered online to nurses and physicians. Construct validity was tested through confirmatory factor analysis.ResultsThe sample included 326 hospital nurses and physicians. The theoretical four-factors model was confirmed and the confirmatory factor analysis yielded acceptable fit indexes. The correlations between the factors were significant and ranged from -0.284 to 0.543 (p < .01). Reliability in terms of internal consistency was satisfactory with Cronbach’s alpha coefficient ranging from 0.918–0.973.ConclusionThis study is the first to provide a validated tool to evaluate the use of WhatsApp in hospitals. The new instrument shows reasonable psychometric properties and is a promising and widely applicable measure of factors that influence the use of WhatsApp in hospitals.
Highlights
In the healthcare context and in hospitals, a growing use of mobile health applications to support clinical and care processes is documented [1,2,3,4,5,6]
Previous research has mainly focused on the advantages and risks of WhatsApp usage in different clinical settings, but limited evidence is available about whether and how individual and organizational determinants can influence the use of WhatsApp in hospitals
For this reasons this study aims to develop a new measure of the individual and institutional determinants that influence the use of WhatsApp in hospitals, as perceived by nurses and physicians
Summary
In the healthcare context and in hospitals, a growing use of mobile health applications to support clinical and care processes is documented [1,2,3,4,5,6]. An increasing number of hospital professionals use instant-messaging applications such as WhatsApp in their daily work and to communicate between peers and with patients [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9] The literature highlighted both advantages and possible risks [10, 11] related to the use of WhatsApp in healthcare in different clinical and care settings. There are still limited studies exploring whether and how individual and organizational determinants can lead the adoption of WhatsApp in hospitals between peer and patients [29]; instruments that can help to explore this phenomenon are lacking For this reasons this study aims to develop a new measure of the individual and institutional determinants that influence the use of WhatsApp in hospitals, as perceived by nurses and physicians. A theoretical four-factor model based on the ‘Technology Acceptance Model’ and the Institutional Theory, guided the development of a new measure of the individual and institutional determinants of WhatsApp usage in hospitals
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