Healthcare professional acceptance of telemonitoring for chronic care patients in primary care.

José Asua,Estibalitz Orruño,Marie Pierre Gagnon,Eva Reviriego

doi:10.1186/1472-6947-12-139

Abstract

BackgroundA pilot experimentation of a telemonitoring system for chronic care patients is conducted in the Bilbao Primary Care Health Region (Basque Country, Spain). It seems important to understand the factors related to healthcare professionals’ acceptance of this new technology in order to inform its extension to the whole healthcare system.This study aims to examine the psychosocial factors related to telemonitoring acceptance among healthcare professionals and to apply a theory-based instrument.MethodsA validated questionnaire, based on an extension of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), was distributed to a total of 605 nurses, general practitioners and paediatricians. Logistic regression analysis was performed to test the theoretical model. Adjusted odds ratios (OR) and their 95% confidence intervals (CI) were computed.ResultsA response rate of 44.3% was achieved. The original TAM model was good at predicting intention to use the telemonitoring system. However, the extended model, that included other theoretical variables, was more powerful. Perceived Usefulness, Compatibility, and Facilitators were the significant predictors of intention. A detailed analysis showed that intention to use telemonitoring was best predicted by healthcare professionals’ beliefs that they would obtain adequate training and technical support and that telemonitoring would require important changes in their practice.ConclusionThe extended TAM explained a significant portion of the variance in healthcare professionals' intention to use a telemonitoring system for chronic care patients in primary care. The perception of facilitators in the organisational context is the most important variable to consider for increasing healthcare professionals’ intention to use the new technology.

Highlights

A pilot experimentation of a telemonitoring system for chronic care patients is conducted in the Bilbao Primary Care Health Region (Basque Country, Spain)
Using a modified version of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) proposed by Davis [35], we found that facilitating conditions were the most important predictor of hospital physicians’ and nurses’ intention to use a telemonitoring system
This study shows that healthcare professionals in primary care have the intention to adopt telemonitoring for the management of chronic care patients

Summary

Introduction

A pilot experimentation of a telemonitoring system for chronic care patients is conducted in the Bilbao Primary Care Health Region (Basque Country, Spain). Telemonitoring enhances self-management where patients are often in charge of transferring self-measured clinical data through the system either to primary care professionals or to a specialised care centre where the received parameters can be integrated with other relevant information related to the state of the patient [2]. Studies report that home telemonitoring is costeffective for the follow-up of high-risk pregnant women [4], patients suffering from heart failure [5] and those with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) [6]

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Discussion

Conclusion