INFORMATION MANAGEMENT IN THE PERSONAL HEALTH RECORD SYSTEM

Information Management In The Personal Health Record System

Information Management In The Personal Health Record System

Table of contents

Chapter IV3

Results3

Results of the Exploratory Descriptive Study3

General Description of the Sample3

Level of understandability of the Continuity of Care Record (CCR) Terminology3

Needs assessments from participants' perspectives13

Chapter V22

Discussion22

Patient health record system and end-users needs23

PHR systems and usefulness of current PHR systems25

To establish the differences in PHR data elements across existing PHR systems28

Implementation challenges31

Future trends41

Recommendation43

How easy is it for a young adult user to understand the CCR data items48

Future research55

Electronic Health Records and Health Policy59

Summary64

Conclusion66

References69

Appendix87

Information Management In The Personal Health Record System

Chapter IV

Results

Results of the Exploratory Descriptive Study

General Description of the Sample

The study sample consisted of 30 participants (15 Female, 15 Male). Participants were generally healthy, young adults (age 18-25) who are native English speakers and able to communicate with the researcher to provide necessary information. All participants (100%) were students within the University of Pittsburgh whose field of study is non-health related such as Engineering, Law, Art and Sciences, etc. All participants (100%) are single and have private health insurance under their parents. Table 9 summarizes the demographic characteristics of the sample such as Age, Gender, Marital Status, Nationality, and Race.

Level of understandability of the Continuity of Care Record (CCR) Terminology

A scale was determined to evaluate the level of understandability of the CCR terminology. Any term with a score between (2.5 to 3.00), its level of understandability is “Easy to Understand”. If the score is (1.5 to 2.49), the term's level of understandability is “Understandable with short definition”. If the score is (.5 to 1.49), the term's level of understandability is “Understandable with long definition”. If the score is less than or equal to .49 (= .49), then the term's level of understandability is “Difficult to understand”.

Table 10 shows the average level of understandability of the Continuity of Care Record (CCR) terminology among the participants (payers/payment sources, advance directives, support sources, functional status, problems, family history, social history, health status, alerts, medications, medical equipment, immunizations, vital signs, plan of care, healthcare provider information, procedures/surgeries, encounters/consultations). (Abdelhak, M. 2005)

As can be seen, participants reported different level of understandability of the CCR data items. Generally participants fully understand some of the CCR data items that are common, popular, and widely used terms by the public such as, family history, medications, immunizations, and procedures/ surgeries and payers/payment source. The average score of understandability of these terms was (2.63 to 3.00) which indicate that the term is “easy to understand” by lay people who do not have the same health background as healthcare providers do. On the other hand, vital signs, encounters/consultations, healthcare providers information, plan of care, and social history are understandable only with providing short definition to participants with an average score of understandability range (1.50 to 1.93). The remaining CCR data items were health status, problems, medical equipment, support sources, functional status, and alerts were understandable with providing long definition to participants with an average score ...