Journal of Health Information Management
Year:2017 | Volume:14 | Issue:3 (55) |Papers Count:7

Introduction: Today, health tourism is one of the fastest-growing and most lucrative forms of tourism, which has turned attracting tourists into a crucial challenge for managers and decision makers. One of the most applicable methods for attracting health tourists is creating tourist villages owning various competitive advantages. This study aims to identify and rank the criteria affecting the locations decisions of health villages in Isfahan province, Iran.Methods: This was a descriptive-analytical study. First, all criteria and sub-criteria affecting the locations decisions of health villages were identified using field study, literature survey, and experts’ opinions. Then, the pairwise comparison questionnaire was designed and a panel of experts and practitioners in the field were invited to complete the questionnaire. Finally, using analytic hierarchy process method, the ranking of criteria was created.Results: Based on the experts’ opinions, 22 sub-criteria affecting the locations decisions of health villages were identified and categorized under 6 main criteria of natural, topographic, climatic, economic, health, and skeletal factors. Subsequently, based on the participants’ opinions, natural landscape factors with 28.65%, health factors with 23.86% and climate factors with 16.87% were identified as the most important factors related to the location decisions of health villages in Isfahan.Conclusion: In addition to the large share of Isfahan province in tourism fields, concentrating on location decisions and development of health villages based on the criteria identified in this study may provide a new competitive advantage for Isfahan within the tourism industry.

Introduction: Many public and service-providing organizations use the Internet in order to provide their clients with optimal services. For this purpose, this study aimed to determine the factors associated with returning of hospital patients to hospital web services.Methods: The survey research method was used in this study. The population of this study included all returning patients to the Internet services of hospitals in Mashhad, Iran. Convenience sampling method was used to select 160 participants. The required data were collected through questionnaires. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling.Results: The path coefficient of patients’ attitude toward using the Internet on their orientation was equal to 0.389, which shows a significant positive impact. The path coefficients of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of clients of hospitals’ Internet services were 0.314 and 0.403, respectively, which show a positive and significant effect. The path coefficient of clients’ tendency toward using hospitals’ Internet services over the patients’ reuse of online services was 0.354, which indicates a positive and significant impact. The research findings also indicated the significant and positive impact of perceived ease of use on perceived usefulness with the path coefficient of 0.563.Conclusion: Facilitating the use of hospital electronic systems and providing the necessary training is recommended to increase the use of hospitals’ Internet services, reduce the number of hospital visitors, and familiarize clients with the advantages of these Internet-based services.

Introduction: Medical centers directly affect the health of the individual and the community; quick and inexpensive access to these centers is important and necessary in urban communities. Site selection of health centers is highly important such that it could improve the well-being of residents and their health. Therefore, the aim of this study was to identify the criteria for suitable locations with priority for the construction of new treatment centers in Maragheh, Iran.Methods: This research is a descriptive-analytical study carried out in Maragheh in 2017. The information required in this research has been obtained through library resources, field observations and user maps obtained from the city's municipality. Data analysis was performed using ArcGis and the Expert Choice Analytical Hierarchy Process software programs.Results: The criterion of proximity to residential centers with a weight of 0.190 and the distance from the existing treatment centers with a weight of 0.150 had the highest effect on the construction of new centers. Also, by overlapping the layers of fifteen criteria, in the end, different zones including very suitable, suitable, relatively suitable, inappropriate and very inappropriate sites were identified for the construction of new treatment centers.Conclusion: The existing treatment centers in Maragheh were not properly distributed, which could have an important role in the health of the residents of the regions without medical centers. In this regard, the ability of geographical information system (GIS) was determined in selecting a proper site for treatment centers.

Introduction: Despite the advantages of altmetrics in research evaluation, it encounters many challenges as a nascent field impacted by web dynamism. The present study attempted to identify the challenges of employing altmetrics’ in evaluating research and to highlight some of the features that required evaluation and validation.Methods: The present communication was a basic descriptive research, applying a qualitative thematic analysis method. It studies the research and theoretical works on citation and altmetric indicators in order to extract the indicators’ weaknesses and challenges.results: The findings led to the identification of many challenges including possibility of indicator manipulation and false improvement, inability to differentiate between positive or negative credits, unbalanced coverage of materials, incompatibility, ambiguities and diversity in the sources of social web, biases, fluctuations, variable nature of social web, equating all citations, lack of standardization, inability to determine the usage type and contexts, and finally inability to measure the quality.Conclusion: Although the altmetrics have many unique strengths that can boost citation analysis, it has several fundamental weaknesses regarding its concepts, services and resources that requires its cautious and conscious use, otherwise its premature and hasty usage would distort research evaluation results.

Introduction: Considering the importance of the quality of hospital hoteling services in healthcare system’s outcomes, and lack of a valid assessment method for determining and implementing required strategies for evaluation and improvement of the service quality, the aim of the present study was to determine factors affecting the hoteling services quality in public hospitals of Iran.Methods: The present quantitative-qualitative study was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, factors affecting hospitals hoteling services’ quality were extracted from the literature as well as from in-depth interviews with 11 experts (i.e., 6 specialists in healthcare administration and 5 in hoteling industry). In the second phase, the data from the first phase were integrated and a model for improving the quality of hospitals’ hoteling services was designed resulting in a researcher-made questionnaire. The model was validated through qualitative (i.e., expert opinion), and quantitative approaches (i.e., exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis). The data for the factor analysis was collected from 960 patients and specialists in 10 teaching hospitals in 10 different cities across the country. Confirmatory factor analysis and multiple regression were used to analyze the data.Results: The findings of present study indicated that 11 factors (physical, functional, economical, human factor, social welfare services, clinical welfare services, safety, cultural, personnel identification, patient guiding factors, and healthcare services) were able to explain 65.81% of the hoteling services’ quality variances. Based on conformity factor analysis, functional and personnel identification factors with a coefficient of 0.953 and 0.779, respectively, had the highest and lowest impact on improvement of the quality of hoteling services in Iranian teaching hospitals.Conclusion: For the improvement of the hoteling services status of Iranian hospitals and considering the 11 factors found in this study, the functional factor must be emphasized and the technical quality of health services be evaluated in the planning of hoteling services.

Introduction: Nurses’ job satisfaction reflects their positive or negative attitude towards their profession that can be influenced by various factors and may directly affect the quality of nursing care. The purpose of this study was to determine the rate of satisfaction of nurses regarding the healthcare reform plan at the Pasteur Hospital in Bam, Iran, in 2016.Methods: This was a descriptive, cross-sectional study. The study participants consisted of 195 nurses at Pasteur Hospital. Sampling method was census and data were collected using a valid and reliable Satisfaction of nurses working in hospitals affiliated to the Ministry of Health questionnaire. Data analysis was performed using ANOVA and independent t-test in SPSS software.Results: According to the results, the highest rate of satisfaction of nursing staff was with the training provided on the healthcare reform plan (1.42% relatively satisfied) and the lowest rate of staff satisfaction was related to the increasing number of patients (1.64% completely dissatisfied). ANOVA results illustrated that satisfaction had a significant association with the number of patients, quality of diagnostic and treatment medical measures, handling of suggestions and requests, satisfaction with patients’ and their relatives’ behavior, the provided training, and work facilities (P = 0.001).Conclusion: Many of the nurses’ were not satisfied with the implementation of the healthcare reform plan. This can affect the nurses’ performance and quality of nursing activities. The results of the present study can assist hospital officials for a better planning for this group.