Abstract
PurposeThe purposes of this study are to describe oncology patient navigation (PN) program perspectives on: (1) use of information systems and processes, (2) uses of program data, and (3) desired information system characteristics.MethodsWe conducted multi-phase data collection to inform development of the Patient Navigation Barriers and Outcomes Tool™ (PN-BOT™), a new information management and reporting tool for oncology PN programs. Phase I was a national online survey of PN staff (n = 343) about data practices. Phase II was a pilot test of a PN-BOT™ prototype with nine PN programs. Survey results were tabulated. Qualitative analysis identified emergent themes from open-response fields from the Phase I survey and open-response survey and interview data from Phase II pilot testers.ResultsPN program information management practices and systems were diverse and often leveraged a patchwork of untailored platforms. Navigators used data to inform navigation tasks, service improvement, research, and reporting. Respondents desired a streamlined, integrated, affordable data system able to minimize data entry burden, meet needs of diverse stakeholders, facilitate navigation work, readily generate reports, and share information among healthcare team members.ConclusionsAlthough oncology navigation programs explore diverse solutions, programs struggle to find health information technologies that sufficiently meet their needs. Information systems designed for oncology PN programs should perform a wide range of functions: be customizable, affordable, interoperable, and have low data entry burden. Organizations exploring solutions should invite PN input in decisions. PN-BOT™ was developed as a free Excel-based tool for PN programs responsive to reported needs.
Highlights
Oncology patient navigation (PN) programs have proliferated rapidly throughout the USA as a promising approach to achieving health equity in cancer care [1,2,3]
Data used in this study were originally collected to inform development of a new, cost-free, data management and evaluation tool designed for oncology PN programs called the BPatient Navigation Barriers and Outcomes ToolTM,^ or BPN-BOTTM^ (Fig. 1) [19]
The data suggest that information systems with high perceived usefulness to PN programs should have the ability to facilitate navigation services, service improvements, reporting, and research
Summary
Oncology patient navigation (PN) programs have proliferated rapidly throughout the USA as a promising approach to achieving health equity in cancer care [1,2,3]. Researchers and practitioners have recognized the Originality: The following manuscript reflects original work and has not been submitted for publication at another journal. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs, Virginia Commonwealth University, 923 W. Franklin Street, Richmond, VA 23284, USA importance of robust data and metrics for PN program evaluation, especially as a relatively new field with diverse mechanisms of funding and sustainability [5,6,7,8,9,10,11]. Recommendations to improve data quality and rigor have included: detailed reporting of program characteristics, prioritization of common standardized outcome metrics, use of validated patient-reported outcomes measures, and shared databases across institutions [5, 12, 14]
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