Journal of Health Information Management
Year:2017 | Volume:14 | Issue:1 (53) |Papers Count:10

Introduction: Picture Archiving and communication system (PACS) has caused a revolution in radiology performance and has increased efficiency in medicine and radiology. Identifying the important factors influencing the success and failure of PACS is necessary to ensure its successful implementation. This study aimed to determine the success factors of PACS using structural equation modeling approach in educational hospitals of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz, Iran. Methods: This cross-sectional, descriptive-correlational study was conducted in 2014. The study population consisted of PACS users (general practitioners, specialists, residents, and radiology experts) in Faghihi and Nemazi Hospitals of Shiraz. The subjects consisted of 250 PACS users, who were selected using stratified random sampling. A questionnaire was used to collect data; its validity was confirmed using confirmatory factor analysis and its reliability was measured using Cronbach's alpha (a = 0.84). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistical methods in SPSS and structural equations modeling technique in LISREL software. Results: Findings showed that the proposed conceptual model for success of PACS in Shiraz University of Medical Sciences has an appropriate fitness in terms of analysis of the constitutive factors. Hypothesis analysis using structural equation modeling showed that 11 hypotheses out of 16 were confirmed and 5 hypotheses w refuted. Factors of individual performance, organizational performance, and perceived usefulness of the system had the greatest impact on the dependence on PACS, respectively.Conclusion: Designing and evaluating health information systems based on standard and well-known models is necessary in order to have quality information, quality systems, and satisfied users. Findings of this study can be a good reference for health care institutions, companies which provide information system services, and information system developers in order to evaluate and promote the quality, usability, and effectiveness of these systems.

Introduction: Changes in the health care system and society along with increase in the power of technology have imposed a mounting pressure on policymakers, healthcare providers, and the health care system to develop electronic medical record systems. Therefore, the aim of this study was to analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) of implemented electronic health record systems from the perspective of hospital managers of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran, in 2015. Methods: This was a cross-sectional, descriptive, and analytical study. The study population included all managers of hospitals affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences. The research instrument was a questionnaire which gathered information on internal factors (strengths and weaknesses) and external factors (opportunities and threats) of electronic health record systems. Data analysis was performed using descriptive statistics and SWOT analysis. Results: The most important strength of electronic records was quick and timely access to information (weight rating: 0.147) and the most important weakness was lack of equipment and hardware necessary for the implementation of electronic health records (weight score: 0.094). Moreover, the sharing of information between health service providers and better management of information (weight score: 0.121) were reported as the most important opportunities, and lack of strategic planning in the field of electronic health records (weight score: 0.127) as the most important threat for these record systems. Conclusion: Politicians and investors in healthcare can use the strategies presented in this research to improve and accelerate the implementation of electronic health records in Iran. Furthermore, drawing a strategic plan, designing standards for security, privacy, and sharing of information, and increasing resources and financing are the steps that can be taken to better implement electronic health records.

Introduction: Ischemic Heart Disease (IHD) is one of the costly and controversial topics in the field of healthcare in Iran. Due to limitation in hospital resources for patient care, studying patient’s length of stay (LOS) is very important in hospital management. This study presents suitable models for estimating the LOS of IHD patients and its influencing factors.Methods: In this applied research, LOS of 6524 IHD in-patients admitted to 16 hospitals in Tehran, Iran, between October 2013 and March 2014 and the remedial proceedings provided for them were recorded using treatment services tariff codes. After data collection using a predesigned form and data cleaning, LOS fort models were created using data mining algorithms of artificial neural network (ANN), support vector machines (SVM), chi-squared automatic interaction detection (CHAID), classification and regression trees (CART), and ensemble model in SPSS Clementine software.Results: The average and standard deviation of LOS in this study was 7.727 ± 9.608 days. The linear correlation of models with actual LOS and their relative error were above 0.7 and below 0.5, respectively. The most accurate models were the ensemble model and SVM. Conclusion: According to the proposed models, ischemic patients who required rehabilitation, consultation, radiation therapy, and computerized tomography (CT) scan have longer LOS. Moreover, type of IHD disease and especially California remedial codes are important factors in estimating patients’ LOS.

Introduction: Due to the importance of women in nomad communities and their roles in family health and hygiene, it is vital to study their familiarity with and resources in this field. The aim of this study was to identify the information needs of nomad women of Kohgiluyeh, Iran, in the field of health and hygiene and how they use resources in this field.Methods: This applied research was conducted through survey method and using a researcher-made questionnaire and oral interviews with 235 nomad women.Results: The results showed that more than 60% of the studied individuals had elementary education and their most important motivation for accessing information was “helping their family to create a healthier life”. Respondents had high inclination toward accessing essential health information and about 56% of them reported their motivation to be very high. Moreover, about 34.9% of participants stated that the role of health centers in increasing their health information was low or very low. The findings also showed that about 59% of nomad women used more traditional sources of information (personal experience and the experience of others).Conclusion: Due to lack of access to necessary information resources among nomad women and the important role of women in nomad communities as a social and economic pillar of the family, it is vital that relevant authorities provide the necessary facilities to meet the information needs of these women.

Introduction: Scholars of different fields need open-access and subscribed electronic resources to access scientific information. However, with the increasing growth of electronic resources and the replacement of printed materials with digital collections, the way we access these resources has changed significantly. Thus, the objective of this study was to assess how dental assistants at Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, and Shahed University, Iran, access and use electronic resources.Methods: This was a descriptive-analytical study. The statistic population consisted of 267 dental assistants at the abovementioned universities. The data collection tool was a researcher-designed questionnaire. The validity of the questionnaire was confirmed by faculty members in the field of Medical Librarianship and Information Sciences and its reliability was approved using Cronbach's alpha (a = 0.88). The collected data were analyzed using one-way ANOVA and Kruskal-Wallis test.Results: Science Direct and PubMed were the most used electronic resources among subscribed and open-access databases, respectively. Participants most often used the subscribed resources which were available at work or home. The respondents reported low internet speed as their most important barrier to accessing information.Conclusion: Dental assistants used subscribed resources which were available at work or university more than others in order to access the full text of subscribed electronic resources. Improving technology and Internet broadband infrastructures would also help decrease the limitations and problems in accessing required information.

Wearable monitoring systems is one of the growing technologies in the medical field. Thus, the present study was conducted to identify and assess wearable monitoring systems in the medical field. This narrative review was carried out by searching in reliable scientific databases such as PubMed, IEEE Xplore, ScienceDirect, Springer, and Iranian databases like Magiran and SID. In order to search in the English databases, keywords such as “wearable technologies in health” “taxonomy of wearable technologies”, and “wearable sensors” were used, and in order to search in the Persian databases, the Persian translation of these keywords were employed. No related articles were found in Persian literature. However, 30 related articles were retrieved from the English databases. All articles that focused on classification, identification, and review of wearable systems in medicine were included in this study. In order to identify wearable technologies accurately, their classification dimensions have been explained in this article.

Introduction: Production of mobile health apps and their use has grown increasingly in recent years which indicate the profound influence of these apps on health care processes and health of the community. Mobile health apps must be made on the basis of reliable scientific resources so that users can use them with confidence. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the reliability of resources used in the creation of the content of the top Persian mobile health applications.Methods: In this descriptive, cross-sectional study conducted in March 2015, 200 of the top mobile health applications were installed, and their references and some of their other features were studied. The data were collected using a checklist, entered into an Excel spreadsheet, and were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Results: Review of the references used in the apps studied showed that 20% of them had no list of references, and only 5.10% (21 cases) used content from reliable sources.Conclusion: The results of this study are applicable to taking control of the quality of mobile health apps and helping users have access to high-quality and reliable apps by regulatory agencies.