Implications For Informatics Research Articles

Increasing Patient Engagement Through the Use of Wearable Technology

With digital technology, patients can be more active in their care and better understand how their behaviors can affect their health in real time. Wearables can provide data and automatic analytics that can help nurse practitioners diagnose issues more quickly and intervene sooner to prevent readmissions or negative sequelae. The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the state of the wearable technology, discuss advantages and challenges, and consider implications for informatics, patient care, and future research.

Implications for informatics given expanding access to care for Veterans and other populations.

Recent investigations into appointment scheduling within facilities operated by the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) illuminate systemic challenges in meeting its goal of providing timely access to care for all Veterans. In the wake of these investigations, new policies have been enacted to expand access to care at VA facilities as well as non-VA facilities if the VA is unable to provide access within a reasonable timeframe or a Veteran lives more than 40 miles from a VA medical facility. These policies are similar to broader health reform efforts that seek to expand access to care for other vulnerable populations. In this perspective, we discuss the informatics implications of expanded access within the VA and its wider applicability across the US health system. Health systems will require robust health information exchange, to maintain coordination while access to care is expanded. Existing informatics research can guide short-term implementation; furthermore, new research is needed to generate evidence about how best to achieve the long-term aim of expanded access to care.

Big Data: Are Biomedical and Health Informatics Training Programs Ready? Contribution of the IMIA Working Group for Health and Medical Informatics Education.

The growing volume and diversity of health and biomedical data indicate that the era of Big Data has arrived for healthcare. This has many implications for informatics, not only in terms of implementing and evaluating information systems, but also for the work and training of informatics researchers and professionals. This article addresses the question: What do biomedical and health informaticians working in analytics and Big Data need to know? We hypothesize a set of skills that we hope will be discussed among academic and other informaticians. The set of skills includes: Programming - especially with data-oriented tools, such as SQL and statistical programming languages; Statistics - working knowledge to apply tools and techniques; Domain knowledge - depending on one's area of work, bioscience or health care; and Communication - being able to understand needs of people and organizations, and articulate results back to them. Biomedical and health informatics educational programs must introduce concepts of analytics, Big Data, and the underlying skills to use and apply them into their curricula. The development of new coursework should focus on those who will become experts, with training aiming to provide skills in "deep analytical talent" as well as those who need knowledge to support such individuals.

Urgent care providers' knowledge and attitude about public health reporting and pertussis control measures: implications for informatics.

We assessed urgent care providers' knowledge about public health reporting, guidelines, and actions for the prevention and control of pertussis; attitudes about public health reporting and population-based data; and perception of reporting practices in their clinic. We identified the 106 providers (95% are physicians) employed in 28 urgent care clinics owned by Intermountain Healthcare located throughout Utah and Southern Idaho. We performed a descriptive, cross-sectional survey and assessed providers' knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors associated with population-based data and public health mandates and recommendations. The online survey was completed between November 1, 2007, and February 29, 2008. Among 63 practicing urgent care providers (60% response rate), 19 percent knew that clinically diagnosed pertussis was reportable, and only half (52%) the providers correctly responded about current pertussis vaccination recommendations. Most (35%-78%) providers did not know the prevention and control measures performed by public health practitioners after reporting occurs, including contact tracing, testing, treatment, and prophylaxis. Half (48%) the providers did not know that health department personnel can prescribe antibiotics for contacts of a reported case, and only 22 percent knew that health department personnel may perform diagnostic testing on contacts. Attitudes about reporting are variable, and reporting responsibility is diffused. To improve our ability to meet public health goals, systems need to be designed that engage urgent care providers in the public health process, improve their knowledge and attitude about reporting, and facilitate the flow of information between urgent care and public health settings.

Implementing Pharmacy Informatics in College Curricula: The AACP Technology in Pharmacy Education and Learning Special Interest Group

Many professional organizations have initiatives to increase the awareness and use of informatics in the practice of pharmacy. Within education we must respond to these initiatives and make technology integral to all aspects of the curriculum, inculcating in students the importance of technology in practice. This document proposes 5 central domains for organizing planning related to informatics and technology within pharmacy education. The document is intended to encourage discussion of informatics within pharmacy education and the implications of informatics in future pharmacy practice, and to guide colleges of pharmacy in identifying and analyzing informatics topics to be taught and methods of instruction to be used within the doctor of pharmacy curriculum.

Computer-Based Health Care Data and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act: Implications for Informatics

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act legislation, originally passed in 1996, has issued the first section of final regulations for standards addressing transactions and code sets. These regulations will affect the field of health care informatics, which has been developing the electronic patient record since the 1980s. With increased emphasis on the development of integrated care systems and telemedicine, the need to address secure transmission of electronic information has brought new developments to this field. Important to the process are the development of technology and policy that support and guide the management of encryption, data transmission and access, systems risk assessment and audit trails, and consumer rights consideration.

Directions for clinical research and genomic research into the next decade: implications for informatics.

Medical informatics is defined largely by its host disciplines in clinical and biological medicine, and to project the agenda for informatics into the next decade, the health community must envision the broad context of biomedical research. This paper is a sketch of this vision, taking into account pressures from changes in the U.S. health care system, the need for more objective information on which to base health care decisions, and the accelerating progress and clinical impact of genomics research. The lessons of modern genomics research demonstrate the power of computing and communication tools to facilitate rapid progress through the adoption of open community standards for information exchange and collaboration. While aspects of this vision are speculative, it seems clear that the core agenda for informatics must be the development of interoperating systems that can facilitate the secure gathering, interchange, and analysis of high-quality information and can gain leverage from worldwide collaboration in advancing and applying new medical knowledge.

Why we should no longer only repair, polish and iron current computer science educations

Various shortcomings of the current computer science/engineering education are identified and analysed. They are seen as being to a large degree due to various currently prevailing misconceptions concerning aims, scope, methods, impacts, long-term rôle and history of the scientific base underlying computing and information processing in general. An attempt is reported to develop a new compelling view of the underlying science — Informatics 1 . This science is seen here not as an engineering science that should primarily serve technology but as a fundamental science (with similar scientific aims as physics) that also affords a new very fundamental and broad methodology (with similar impacts as mathematics has). A new view is presented on aims, maturity, and breadth of the current Informatics as fundamental science and on the history of Informatics. In addition, some developments indicating deeper relations between Informatics and physics are discussed as well as some implications for Informatics from views on science developed in mathematics. All that is then used to derive some general and also more specific conclusions concerning aims and methods of the computer science/engineering education, as well as of the education in Informatics within other educational programmes. 1 In order to emphasize that we have in mind a new view of informatics we shall use this term with a capital I.

Implications of Informatics on Health Problems in Mexico

Computer and information technologies must be assessed from a biomedical point of view to optimize the use of automated integration of health care information in addressing health problems. This pa...