Caller Type Research Articles

Frequent contacts to Emergency Medical Services (EMS): more than frequent callers

BackgroundA frequent caller is defined by The Frequent Caller National Network (FreCaNN) as an adult who makes five or more emergency calls in a month or twelve or more in three months, related to individual episodes of care. However, we believe that when limiting the definition to those who call themselves, one underestimates the impact frequent contacts have on the Emergency Medical Communication Center (EMCC) and the Emergency Medical Services (EMS).MethodWe conducted a descriptive retrospective cross-sectional database review of frequent contacts; defined as persons who have ≥ 5 contacts in a month or ≥ 12 contacts in three months. Data were provided from Oslo EMCC, between 1. January 2017 and 31. December 2022. Contrary to the FreCaNN definition, we included all types of contacts and callers, both emergent and non-emergent, regarding patients of all ages.ResultsDuring the study period, 2.149.400 contacts were registered. Of these 129.700 were contacts from frequent callers, where the patients called themselves. When including contacts frequently made on behalf of a patient, we found that 268.723 fit the definition of frequent emergency contacts. When also taking non-emergent contacts into account, a total of 437.361 contacts fit the definition of frequent contacts.ConclusionWhen limiting the criteria to only frequent callers, one underestimates the impact persons who have frequent contacts, have on the EMCC and the EMS. We were able to distinguish between three categories—contacts from frequent callers, frequent emergency contacts, and frequent contacts. We believe broadening the definition can benefit both research and audits, when accessing the use of emergency resources to patients with frequent requests for help to the EMCCs.

COVID-19-related queries received by the National Health Laboratory Service and the National Institute for Communicable Diseases in South Africa: January to August 2020

The National Institute for Communicable Diseases − a division of the National Health Laboratory Service − launched a clinician and public hotline, adapted from an existing NICD clinicians’ hotline, to guide healthcare workers and members of the public on COVID-19-related queries. The hotlines received over 150 000 queries within eight months. We describe the queries so as to inform recommendations for tailoring clinician training, improving access to information, and guiding health promotion. A retrospective description of data from the NHLS-NICD clinician and public hotlines from January to August 2020 was performed. Queries were analysed by province, caller type and sector. A thematic analysis with a deductive and semantic approach was used to describe the reason for each query. From January to August 2020, 99.9% (152 766/152 985) of queries attended to on the hotlines were related to COVID-19, with most queries being made in April (n=53 471). The majority of queries were from members of the public (95.0%), and from the public sector (97.0%). Gauteng Province accounted for most queries (42.9%). General information on COVID-19, advice for testing and administrative/systems issues (related to nationwide announcements/events), together accounted for the largest proportion of COVID-19 queries, at 86.0%. The hotline provided general and clinical COVID-19 advice. Data from the hotline mirrored information gaps and distributions of concerns related to COVID-19, and could be used to guide clinician training and public informationsharing. A significant proportion of the queries did not fall within the NHLS-NICD scope of practice, indicating a need for targeted public engagement and education. Future outbreak hotline services could be planned on the basis of this experience to define the objectives of contact centres and establish these in awareness campaigns

Investigating the distribution of calls to a North American animal poison control call center by veterinarians and the public in space, time, and space-time.

Health assessments via phone call or tele-triage have become very popular. Tele-triage in the veterinary field and North American context is available since the early 2000s. However, there is little knowledge of how caller type influences the distribution of calls. The objectives of this study were to examine the distribution of calls to the Animal Poison Control Center (APCC) by caller type in space, time, and space-time. Data regarding caller location were obtained from the APCC by American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). The data were analysed using the spatial scan statistic to identify clusters of higher-than-expected proportion of veterinarian or public calls in space, time, and space-time. Statistically significant spatial clusters of increased call frequencies by veterinarians were identified in some western, midwestern, and southwestern states for each year of the study period. Furthermore, annual clusters of increased call frequencies by the general public were identified from some northeastern states. Based on yearly scans, we identified statistically significant temporal clusters of higher-than-expected public calls during Christmas/winter holidays. During space-time scans of the entire study period, we identified a statistically significant cluster of higher-than-expected proportion of veterinarian calls at the beginning of the study period in the western, central, and southeastern states followed by a significant cluster of excess public calls near the end of the study period on the northeast. Our results suggest that user patterns of the APCC vary by region and both season and calendar time.

National COVID-19 lockdown and trends in help-seeking for violence against children in Zimbabwe: an interrupted time-series analysis

BackgroundAn estimated 1.8 billion children live in countries where COVID-19 disrupted violence prevention and response. It is important to understand how government policies to contain COVID-19 impacted children’s ability to seek help, especially in contexts where there was limited formal help-seeking prior to the pandemic. We aimed to quantify how the national lockdown in Zimbabwe affected helpline calls for violence against children, estimated the number of calls that would have been received had the lockdown not occurred and described characteristics of types of calls and callers before and after the national lockdown.MethodsWe used an interrupted time series design to analyse the proportion of violence related calls (17,913 calls out of 57,050) to Childline Zimbabwe’s national child helpline between 2017 to 2021. We applied autoregressive integrated moving average regression (ARIMA) models to test possible changes in call trends before and after the March 2020 lockdown and forecasted how many calls would have been received in the absence of lockdown. In addition, we examined call characteristics before and after lockdown descriptively.ResultsThe proportion of violence related calls decreased in the 90 days after the lockdown and subsequently returned to pre-COVID-19 levels. We estimate that 10.3% (95% confidence interval [CI] 6.0–14.6%) more violence related calls would have occurred in this period had there not been a lockdown. Violence was increasingly reported as occurring in children’s households, with fewer reports from children and formal child protection actors.ConclusionsLockdowns dramatically change everyday life and strain populations, which is unlikely to reduce violence prevalence but may reduce help-seeking. The three months after COVID-19 lockdowns may be key time periods when help-seeking for violence decreases drastically. Policy makers should ensure that in-person and remote services support help-seeking. Interventions and campaigns may additionally want to target adult female family members in encouraging reporting of suspected violence cases when they occur within households and are perpetuated by other family members. We suggest a composite approach of scaling-up remote reporting mechanisms that are accessible and geographically well-distributed, establishing non-traditional sites for help seeking within communities and continuing limited in-person home visitation for known cases of violence.

Examining the differential use of a North American animal poison control call center by veterinarians and the public for dog-related calls.

Tele-triage, a subset of telehealth services, is becoming increasingly common, they offer users the ability to receive credible health advice from licensed professionals in the comfort of their own home. In the field of veterinary medicine, tele-triage services have been employed since the early 2000s, but there has been little examination of how these services are used by callers. The objectives of this study were to explore how the use of an animal poison control center (APCC) tele-triage service varied between veterinarians and the public in terms of toxicant type, animal demographics, availability of veterinary services, as well as seasonal and secular trends. Data regarding dog poisoning events were obtained from the APCC of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals' (ASPCA). We fitted a mixed logistic regression model with random intercepts for county and state and identified associations between caller type and the following: animal characteristics (i.e., age, weight, breed-class), type of toxicant, season, year, and access to veterinary services (i.e., veterinarians per capita in the county of the caller). The model included interaction effects between season and both plant and pesticide toxicants. There was also an interaction between year and access to veterinary care. Further investigations are needed to understand how the novelty of a toxicant and the severity of clinical signs associated with a toxicant predict the type of caller, if pet demographics are associated with the caller based on medical issues or owner attitudes, and how access to veterinary care influences the use of this tele-triage service.

A descriptive analysis of calls to the NSW Teratogen Information Service regarding use of anti-infectives during pregnancy.

BackgroundMotherSafe is a free telephone-based counseling service for Australian consumers and health-care providers concerned about drug exposures during pregnancy and breastfeeding. Anti-infectives are the most commonly prescribed drugs for pregnant women. This study aims to provide a descriptive analysis of prospectively collected calls received by MotherSafe regarding anti-infective exposures during pregnancy between 2000 and 2020. Aggregate data were examined by type of caller, reason for call, pregnancy category and exposure type. Inductive thematic analysis of the comments recorded by MotherSafe counsellors at the time of call was undertaken.ResultsOver the study period, 25,890 calls related to exposure to anti-infectives during pregnancy (antibiotic, antiviral, and antifungal medications). Calls from patients were dominated by low-risk exposures (pregnancy category A) to drugs while calls from health care professionals related to drugs with limited human information (pregnancy category B3). Analysis of MotherSafe counsellor comments revealed over 200 instances of concerns relating to health care professional advice to the patient. Three themes emerged: incorrect or conflicting advice, poor counselling, and refusal to treat, prescribe or dispense. It is likely that these comments are biased to the negative as patients would not call MotherSafe if they were happy with HCP advice. However, the findings are concerning as they reveal an underlying lack of knowledge in some health care professionals which may have led to undertreatment of patients. This study reinforced the importance of Teratogen Information Services such as MotherSafe in providing counselling and clear communication of evidence-based information to guide decision-making, reducing potential emotional distress in pregnant women, and optimizing maternal, pregnancy and infant outcomes.

Utilisation of after-hours telephone support in a home-based hospice service

BackgroundAfter-hours support from hospice providers is instrumental to patients with serious illness who choose to remain at home, particularly at end of life. Utilisation of out-of-hours support has been much characterised in terms of frequency and nature of calls, but more needs to be known to inform service customisation and resource allocation to optimise care. To this end, we stratify reasons for using the after-hours helpline according to time sensitivity, and to explore disease and person factors associated with urgent calls.MethodElectronic medical records for incoming calls from external parties outside workhours within a large home hospice in Singapore were analysed inductively, to identify patterns and associations along study objectives. Individual code books for caller type and call reasons were created and tested in vivo, and later administered to extracted data. Patients that accessed the helpline were tracked for different outcomes, including hospital admissions and on-call home visits. Logistic regression modelling was performed to categorise call reasons by urgency and to identify disease and person factors associated with time sensitive calls.ResultsMore than 5,000 calls to the helpline were made over a two-year period (2019-2020), predominantly by family caregivers (88.4%). These were in relation to 2,303 unique patients (38.9% of total patients served). After-hours calls were made an average of 2.3 times by patients across various lengths of service. Only 11.9% of calls were deemed time sensitive or urgent, requiring home visits by on-call staff (4%) or resulting in admission to hospital (7.9%). The majority were managed by primary care teams on the next workday (65.1%) and the remainder sorted during the after-hours call itself (22.3%). Call reasons or presenting issues were classified into two groups according to urgency. Calls in the year 2020, from the younger patient, preferred place of death outside the home, and caller types other than patient or healthcare worker were significantly associated with urgent calls.ConclusionDeeper characterisation of after-hours calls offers possibilities: service redesign for optimal resourcing and customised training for better care. Ultimately, planners, providers, and patients all stand to benefit.

Transfer rate prediction at self-service customer support platforms in insurance contact centers

Customer support constitutes the face of a brand and plays a critical role in shaping customers retention and loyalty. To facilitate customer contacts and to reduce the corresponding operating costs, organizations resort to self-service interaction channels. However, dealing with self-service customer support platforms has been identified to be one of the most frustrating aspects of a poor customer contact experience. This paper builds on real data from contact centers of a major U.S. insurance company, covering about 10 million calls, to study transfer rate at the interactive voice-response platform. We develop an empirical model to analyze features that exert significant impact on the likelihood that a call arrived to the platform is eventually transferred to a live agent. We find evidence that caller types, specific caller intents, trying distinct channels, and payment attempts can help predicting the transfer outcome. Our study confirms the importance of a caller’s location attribute and evinces that the size and composition of the set of effective features and their directions vary substantially across different states. Our results provide managers with several actionable insights to enhance the customer contact experience. For example, our feature selection analysis enables designing personalized interactive voice-response systems based on customer-contact features. Identifying those calls expected to be transferred at any time can guide recruiting and scheduling a workforce with appropriate skill sets. In addition, the transfer rate is a key input variable for various decision making problems arising in the management of call center operations.

The impact of caller characteristics on levonorgestrel emergency contraception access in West Virginia community pharmacies

ObjectiveAccess to levonorgestrel (LNG) emergency contraception (EC) has increased since the FDA removed age restrictions on over-the-counter (OTC) LNG EC in 2013, but availability is highly variable and numerous barriers to access remain. The purpose of this study was to assess availability and accessibility of LNG EC at community pharmacies in West Virginia (WV). MethodsA mystery caller cross-sectional study was conducted to assess availability and accessibility of LNG EC. Inquiries were made by identified ‘research’ staff and by staff presenting as a 16 y/o. ResultsNearly half of community pharmacies reported having LNG EC in stock. Pharmacy staff were significantly more likely to tell research callers LNG EC was in stock (53%) and more likely to report willingness to order it (50%) than ‘teen’ callers (45% and 34%, respectively). There was no significant difference between caller types on the five barriers assessed. ConclusionLack of availability may contribute to teen and unintended pregnancies.

Emergency Contraception Access and Counseling in Metropolitan and Nonmetropolitan Pharmacies in Georgia

Background: Emergency contraception (EC) efficacy is dependent on timing of administration. Adequate pharmacy stock information and accurate patient counseling are important to ensure timely access. Objective: This study evaluates pharmacist reported availability and counseling for levonorgestrel (LNG) and ulipristal acetate (UPA), and identifies differences between caller type and pharmacies in metropolitan vs nonmetropolitan areas of Georgia. Methods: This prospective, randomized, telephone-based study included 25% of Georgia community pharmacies, stratified by geographic location. Calls were made by investigators, first posing as a mystery shopper inquiring about EC stock and efficacy, then 3–6 weeks later as a researcher inquiring about EC stock. Analysis utilized descriptive statistics, chi Square, and logistic regression. Results: Of 600 pharmacies, the mystery shopper caller reached 86%: 74% of pharmacists initially discussed LNG, 57.1% had it stocked, more often in metropolitan areas (OR 1.7, 95% CI 1.08–2.6). Ulipristal acetate was discussed by 1.9% and reported in-stock < 1%. Of those who discussed window of efficacy, 79% indicated LNG would either not work 4 days after intercourse or they were unsure. The research caller successfully completed a second call for 64% of pharmacies: 57% stocked LNG, 3% stocked UPA, and UPA was more likely to be stocked in metropolitan pharmacies. Conclusion: In Georgia, UPA availability is poor, and nonmetropolitan pharmacies were less likely to stock LNG and UPA. A minority of pharmacists correctly indicated that LNG may work up to 120 hours after intercourse. Strategies are needed to overcome barriers to EC availability in community pharmacies and support pharmacists’ EC counseling.

FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO DELAYED AMBULANCE RESPONSE TIME USING AMBULANCE VEHICLE LOCATOR AND GLOBAL INTEGRATING SYSTEM (AVL- GIS) AT HOSPITAL UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA

&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; This study aims to determine ambulance response time in KubangKerian district, Kelantan, Malaysia using Ambulance Vehicle Locator and Global Integrating System (AVL-GIS) device and the factors associated with delayed response time. This was a 6-months prospective, cross-sectional study conducted at Emergency and Trauma Department, Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (HUSM) in Kubang Kerian, Kelantan, Malaysia. The possible factors identified to have caused delayed ambulance response time from previous literature were included in this study. All prehospital cases from September 2017 until February 2018 attended to by AVL- GIS installed ambulances were included in this study. Data were obtained from the standardized prehospital Proforma forms and extracted from AVL-GIS using iGPS software. Simple and multiple logistic regression tests were used to determine the factors associated to delayed response time. From 505 cases, 75% found to be delayed case meanwhile 25% is non delayed case as defined in study protocol. Further analysis on delayed cases show that call duration, caller type, traffic condition, travelling time and team allocation time were associated with delayed ambulance response time. Evaluation of each component contributing to delayed ambulance response time is needed for intervention to improve prehospital care in the future.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D;

스포츠 브랜드 네이티브 광고의 콘텐츠 소재와 발신자 유형이 광고효과에 미치는 영향

스포츠 브랜드 네이티브 광고의 콘텐츠 소재와 발신자 유형이 광고효과에 미치는 영향

Behavior of Callers to a Crisis Helpline Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Quantitative Data Analysis.

BackgroundThe World Health Organization declared the outbreak of COVID-19 to be an international pandemic in March 2020. While numbers of new confirmed cases of the disease and death tolls are rising at an alarming rate on a daily basis, there is concern that the pandemic and the measures taken to counteract it could cause an increase in distress among the public. Hence, there could be an increase in need for emotional support within the population, which is complicated further by the reduction of existing face-to-face mental health services as a result of measures taken to limit the spread of the virus.ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to determine whether the COVID-19 pandemic has had any influence on the calls made to Samaritans Ireland, a national crisis helpline within the Republic of Ireland.MethodsThis study presents an analysis of calls made to Samaritans Ireland in a four-week period before the first confirmed case of COVID-19 (calls=41,648, callers=3752) and calls made to the service within a four-week period after a restrictive lockdown was imposed by the government of the Republic of Ireland (calls=46,043, callers=3147). Statistical analysis was conducted to explore any differences between the duration of calls in the two periods at a global level and at an hourly level. We performed k-means clustering to determine the types of callers who used the helpline based on their helpline call usage behavior and to assess the impact of the pandemic on the caller type usage patterns.ResultsThe analysis revealed that calls were of a longer duration in the postlockdown period in comparison with the pre–COVID-19 period. There were changes in the behavior of individuals in the cluster types defined by caller behavior, where some caller types tended to make longer calls to the service in the postlockdown period. There were also changes in caller behavior patterns with regard to the time of day of the call; variations were observed in the duration of calls at particular times of day, where average call durations increased in the early hours of the morning.ConclusionsThe results of this study highlight the impact of COVID-19 on a national crisis helpline service. Statistical differences were observed in caller behavior between the prelockdown and active lockdown periods. The findings suggest that service users relied on crisis helpline services more during the lockdown period due to an increased sense of isolation, worsening of underlying mental illness due to the pandemic, and reduction or overall removal of access to other support resources. Practical implications and limitations are discussed.

Using of pre-hospital emergency resources by acute alcoholism patients in a hospital in Guangzhou: a data survey from 2009 to 2018

To analyze the using of pre-hospital emergency resources and treatment characteristics of acute alcoholism patients in Guangzhou. The pre-hospital emergency data of the emergency department of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University from January 1st in 2009 to December 31st in 2018 were obtained from the database of the Guangzhou Emergency Medical Command Center. The related data of patients with acute alcoholism were collected, including gender, age, poisoning severity, treatment results, caller type, number of empty vehicles (empty vehicle was defined as the empty vehicle return caused by the ambulance who did not receive or refused to come to the hospital after the ambulance leaved), departure time (from the ambulance to the completion time), on-site time (from the ambulance to the patient boarding time) and the distribution of pre-hospital emergency time in 24 hours on weekdays and weekends. The relationship between acute alcoholism patients and the peak of in-hospital emergency treatment was analyzed. A total of 2 408 acute alcoholism patients were recorded, among whom 2 109 patients (87.58%) with acute alcoholism,126 (5.23%) with drug poisoning, 67 (2.78%) with chemical poisoning, 3 (0.13%) with pesticide poisoning, and 103 (4.28%) with other poisoning. Acute alcoholism patients were mainly male, with a total of 1 862 cases (88.29%), and the ratio between males and females was 7.54:1. In 2 109 patients with acute alcoholism, 93.41% were in the age range of 18-59 years old. The number of mild patients was 1 717 (81.41%), 1 178 (55.86%) needed further treatment, and no patient died. For the occupation of pre-hospital emergency resources, 43.24% (912/2 109) of acute alcoholism called 120 through 110 with empty vehicles of 36.79% (776/2 109), which were significantly higher than the acute cerebrovascular disease [3.83% (362/9 461), 5.80% (549/9 461), both P < 0.01], acute trauma [24.29% (1 708/7 033), 7.96% (560/7 033), both P < 0.01], acute circulation system disease [2.44% (90/3 694), 2.87% (106/3 694), both P < 0.01], and acute respiratory system disease [0.86% (31/3 606), 1.58% (57/3 606), both P < 0.01]. Furthermore, empty vehicles were more likely to happen through 110 with empty vehicles rate of 51.75% (472/912), which was significantly higher than that through the witness [40.82% (60/147), P < 0.01] and relatives and friends [23.24% (244/1 050), P < 0.01]. The driving time and on-site time of acute alcoholism were significantly shorter than those of acute cerebrovascular disease, acute circulation system disease, and acute respiratory system disease [driving time (minutes): 26 (20, 34) vs. 34 (26, 45), 38 (29, 49), 38 (29, 50); on-site time (minutes): 6 (4, 10) vs. 10 (7, 14), 10 (7, 15), 10 (8, 15), all P < 0.01], but there was no statistical difference as compared with acute trauma [driving time (minutes): 26 (20, 34) vs. 29 (20, 42), on-site time (minutes): 6 (4, 10) vs. 7 (4, 11), both P > 0.05]. The regularity of variation in number of critically acute alcoholism patients was distinctive, which peaked in the period of 21:00-00:00 and bottomed out in the period of 09:00-13:00, which overlapped with the peak flow in the hospital emergency department (17:00-22:00). Acute alcoholism patients occupy excessive pre-hospital emergency resources, and overlap with the hospital emergency treatment peak. It is necessary to strengthen the public propaganda and education on the rational usage of 120 emergency resources and reduce waste.

Utilisation of a NSW teratology information service by pharmacists and patients referred by a pharmacist from 2000 to 2018.

MotherSafe is a free telephone counselling service for exposures during pregnancy and breastfeeding. As the last health professional seen prior to consumption of medicines, community pharmacists' opinions on the use of medications in pregnancy/breastfeeding is likely to be particularly sought by women presenting in pharmacies. However, a recent qualitative study revealed that community pharmacists feel unsupported in their role as medicine information providers to pregnant/breastfeeding women. The aim of the current study was to undertake a descriptive analysis of calls made by pharmacists or pharmacist-referred patients to MotherSafe across the time period 2000-2018. A retrospective, descriptive study was conducted of call data from January 2000 to December 2018. Aggregate data were examined by type of caller, reason for call, pregnancy category and exposure type. Most calls (57%) related to pregnancy or breastfeeding (39%) with calls equally distributed throughout gestation. Calls regarding potential pregnancy exposures to uncategorised drugs were the most frequent (mainly complementary medicines). Unlike pharmacists, calls from pregnant consumers referred by pharmacists were also frequently regarding category A drugs. This study highlights the need for reliable evidence-based information sources regarding the use of prescribed medications, over-the-counter and complementary preparations during pregnancy and breastfeeding. There is a need for better education of pharmacists about appropriate information sources and the need to use evidence-based resources other than the A-X categories to advise their clients about the safety or otherwise of medications in pregnancy and breastfeeding.

Using a Call Center to Reduce Harm From Self-Administration of Reproductive Health Medicines in Bangladesh: Interrupted Time-Series.

BackgroundAnnually, there are approximately 25 million unsafe abortions, and this remains a leading cause of maternal morbidity and mortality. In settings where abortion is restricted, women are increasingly able to self-manage abortions by purchasing abortion medications such as misoprostol and mifepristone (RU-486) from pharmacies or other drug sellers. Better availability of these drugs has been shown to be associated with reductions in complications from unsafe abortions. In Bangladesh, abortion is restricted; however, menstrual regulation (MR) was introduced in the 1970s as an interim method of preventing pregnancy. Pharmacy provision of medications for MR is widespread, but customers purchasing these drugs from pharmacies often do not have access to quality information on dosage and potential complications.ObjectiveThis study aimed to describe a call center intervention in Bangladesh, and assess call center use over time and how this changed when a new MR product (combined mifepristone-misoprostol) was introduced into the market.MethodsIn 2010, Marie Stopes Bangladesh established a care provider–assisted call center to reduce potential harm from self-administration of MR medications. The call center number was advertised widely in pharmacies and on MR product packaging. We conducted a secondary analysis of routine data collected by call center workers between July 2012 and August 2016. We investigated the reported types of callers, the reason for call, and reported usage of MR products before and after November 2014. We used an interrupted time series (ITS) analysis to formally assess levels of change in caller characteristics and reasons for calling.ResultsOver the 4-year period, 287,095 calls about MR were received and the number of users steadily increased over time. The most common callers (of 287,042 callers) were MR users (67,438, 23.49%), their husbands (65,999, 22.99%), pharmacy workers (65,828, 22.93%), and village doctors (56,036, 19.52%). Most MR calls were about misoprostol, but after November 2014, a growing proportion of calls were about the mifepristone-misoprostol regimen. The most common reasons (of 287,042 reasons) for calling were to obtain information about the regimen (208,605, 72.66%), to obtain information about side effects (208,267, 72.54%), or to report side effects (49,930, 17.39%). The ITS analyses showed that after November 2014, an increasing number of calls were from MR users who had taken the complete regimen (P=.02 and who were calling to discuss reported side effects (P=.01) and pain medication (P=.01), and there were fewer calls asking about dosages (P<.001).ConclusionsThe high call volume suggests that this call center intervention addressed an unmet demand for information about MR medications from both MR users and health care providers. Call center interventions may improve the quality of information available by providing information directly to MR users and drug sellers, and thus reducing the potential harm from self-management of MR medications.

Prevalence and characteristics of pregnancy- and lactation-related calls to the National Poison Centre in Belgium: A retrospective analysis of calls from 2012 to 2017.

In the absence of a Teratology Information Service in Belgium, the National Poison Centre might act as a substitute centre for answering pregnancy- and lactation-related questions regarding medication use. The aim of this study was to define the prevalence and characteristics of pregnancy- and lactation-related calls to the National Poison Centre in Belgium, as well as the type of health products involved during these calls. A retrospective, descriptive study on pregnancy- and lactation-related calls involving health products received by the Belgian Poison Centre between January 2012 and December 2017 was performed. Health products were categorized as registered medicines or non-registered health products; medicines were further classified according to the Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical classification system. The Poison Centre annually received about 361 calls related to pregnancy and lactation. Pregnant and lactating women mainly called the Poison Centre themselves in case of exposure, while relatives were the predominant type of caller when preventive information was requested. The Poison Centre was mostly contacted for information about medicines and especially for preventive questions during lactation. Many questions involved over-the-counter medicines such as paracetamol and ibuprofen. Given the safety issues related to some involved products (eg, ibuprofen, zolpidem, benzodiazepines, and pseudoephedrine), seeking for advice was justified. The Belgian Poison Centre received almost daily calls from patients and health care professionals on medication exposure during pregnancy and lactation. These findings underline the importance of evidence-based counselling of pregnant and lactating women and should encourage health care professionals to engage themselves more actively when counselling on the rational use of medicines during pregnancy and lactation. The findings also contribute to the ongoing discussion to establish a Teratology Information Service in Belgium.

Turkish Telemedical Assistance Service: last four years of activity.

Telemedical Assistance Service (TMAS) is very important for seafarers and passengers who are far from full-fledged health services. This study aimed to determine the frequency of using Turkish TMAS by seafarers and other patients and to compare the given services. The data obtained from calls to Turkish TMAS in between 2014 and 2017 are composed of 5080 calls. In the study, they were examined in two groups as calls regarding seafarers and other patients. Also, the diseases or injuries related to these calls were evaluated in 22 main groups according to ICD-10 code. All of these cases were analysed by using descriptive statistics according to types of callers, type of diseases, types of given services and methods of contacts. There were 5080 contacts to Turkish TMAS from January 2014 to December 2017. Contacts were 92.3% for seafarers and 7.7% for other patients. The most common reason of contacts was similar for both seafarers and other patients and it was injury and poisoning situations. While the most common service given to seafarers was giving a medicine or other treatment, the most common service given to other patients was medical evacuation. This study laid weight on diseases or injuries of seafarers and other patients at sea. According to this situation, TMAS can improve and maintain its service quality and also in the light of the findings, a guide for seafarers and other patients can be prepared in order to lessen such diseases and injuries.

Data analytics of call log data to identify caller behaviour patterns from a mental health and well-being helpline.

This work presents an analysis of 3.5 million calls made to a mental health and well-being helpline, seeking to answer the question, what different groups of callers can be characterised by specific usage patterns? Calls were extracted from a telephony informatics system. Each call was logged with a date, time, duration and a unique identifier allowing for repeat caller analysis. We utilized data mining techniques to reveal new insights into help-seeking behaviours. Analysis was carried out using unsupervised machine learning (K-means clustering) to discover the types of callers, and Fourier transform was used to ascertain periodicity in calls. Callers can be clustered into five or six caller groups that offer a meaningful interpretation. Cluster groups are stable and re-emerge regardless of which year is considered. The volume of calls exhibits strong repetitive intra-day and intra-week patterns. Intra-month repetitions are absent. This work provides new data-driven findings to model the type and behaviour of callers seeking mental health support. It offers insights for computer-mediated and telephony-based helpline management.

Predicting Caller Type From a Mental Health and Well-Being Helpline: Analysis of Call Log Data.

BackgroundThis paper presents an analysis of call data records pertaining to a telephone helpline in Ireland among individuals seeking mental health and well-being support and among those who are in a suicidal crisis.ObjectiveThe objective of our study was to examine whether rule sets generated from decision tree classification, trained using features derived from callers’ several initial calls, could be used to predict what caller type they would become.MethodsMachine learning techniques were applied to the call log data, and five distinct patterns of caller behaviors were revealed, each impacting the helpline capacity in different ways.ResultsThe primary findings of this study indicate that a significant model (P<.001) for predicting caller type from call log data obtained from the first 8 calls is possible. This indicates an association between callers’ behavior exhibited during initial calls and their behavior over the lifetime of using the service.ConclusionsThese data-driven findings contribute to advanced workload forecasting for operational management of the telephone-based helpline and inform the literature on helpline caller behavior in general.