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This paper seeks to provide a narrative review of some of the factors that influence healthcare consumers' information seeking involving healthcare associated infections (HAI) on the internet.

The paper takes the form of a narrative review arising from the authors' presentation and subsequent discussions that took place during the Universities Council Symposium held in Vancouver, Canada in May 2011.

There are a number of important factors that affect healthcare consumers' desire to seek information online about HAI, including the search engine used, the type of technology used, web site usability, information availability, consumers' learning style, consumers' personality traits, and finally, consumers' situational, emotional, and psychological contexts. These factors may affect healthcare consumers' decision making about where they will obtain healthcare (i.e. in their selection of a clinic, hospital, regional health authority and/or health care system).

HAI reporting via web sites is being done by health care organizations across North America. There is a need to more fully understand the factors that affect consumer use of these web sites.

Fundamental questions have been raised about the impact of providing HAI information over the WWW. There is a need to consider the varying factors that influence consumers' information seeking involving the WWW (i.e. technology‐driven and consumer‐driven factors) especially when searching for HAI‐related information about health care organizations.

Historically, HAI information was the purview of those who had a background to interpret such data (e.g. infection control and public health practitioners). The literature focusing on what consumers want to know regarding HAIs over the WWW is only beginning to emerge. More research is needed to better understand what health care consumers need to support their decision making involving HAIs.

The purpose of this paper is to review stakeholder perspectives and provide a framework for improving governance in health data stewardship. Patients may wish to view their own lab results or clinical records, but others (notably academics, journalists and lawyers) tend to want scores of patient records in their search for patterns or trends. Public Health informatics capabilities are growing in scope and speed as clinical information systems, health information exchange networks and other potential database linkages enable more access to healthcare data. This change facilitates novel service improvements, but also raises new personal privacy protection issues.

This paper summarizes a panel session discussion from the 2015 Information Technology and Communication in Health biennial international conference. The perspectives of health service research, journalism, Public Health informatics and privacy protection were represented.

In North America, an expectation of personal privacy exists as a quasi-constitutional right. Individuals should be allowed to control the amount of information shared about them, and in particular the public expects that details of their personal healthcare data are protected. This is supported by laws, regulations and administrative structures; however, there are fundamental differences between the approaches taken in Canada and in the USA. In both countries, population and Public Health has wide powers to collect data and share it appropriately in order to accomplish a social good. A recent report issued by the British Columbia Information and Privacy Commissioner, and a recent story issued by the Bloomberg News service, highlight ways in which laws and regulations have not kept pace with advances in technology. Changes are needed to enable population and Public Health agencies to protect confidential personal information while still being able to comply with legitimate requests for data by researchers, policy makers and the public at large.

Similarities and differences in approach, gaps, current issues and recommendations of several countries were revealed in a conference session. Those concepts and the likelihood of ensuing legislative changes directly impact healthcare organizations’ patients and leadership.

From a perspective inside one of the most advanced of the state programs, this presentation aims to explore issues of whom are we trying to reach; what information are we trying to convey; when did this reporting start; where can anyone find reports; why are we doing this; and how does it work. This is, however, neither a typical consumer informatics problem nor a subject that public health is used to dealing with.

The paper is a narrative review of personal experience.

Despite achievements, there are fundamental knowledge gaps and unsubstantiated assumptions underlying mandatory public reporting. Research and better role delineation are urgently needed to optimize current choices and ultimately determine whether this is the most cost‐effective strategy among alternative prevention investments.

Public health departments are in uncharted territory with this new area of activity, faced with fundamental knowledge gaps that potentially hamper chances of success. Perspectives explored in this part of the Universities Council Symposium help frame a research agenda and guide evolution of less advanced programs.

The Universities Council, established and coordinated by Washington State's HAI Program, is unique in taking an interdisciplinary approach to comprehensive examination of the unsubstantiated assumptions underlying mandatory public reporting.

Expanding networks of data portals and repositories linked to electronic patient record systems, along with advances in information technology, have created both new opportunities in improving public health and new challenges in protecting patient privacy. The purpose of this paper is to review stakeholder perspectives and provide a framework for promoting implementation of current privacy protection improvement recommendations.

This paper summarizes a workshop session discussion stemming from the 2017 Information Technology and Communication in Health (ITCH) biennial international conference in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The perspectives within health service research, journalism, informatics and privacy protection were represented.

Problems underlying gaps in privacy protection in the USA and Canada, along with then-current changes recommended by public health leaders as well as Information and Privacy Commissioners, were identified in a session of the 2015 ITCH conference. During the 2017 conference, a workshop outlined the current situation, identifying ongoing challenges and a lack of significant progress. This paper summarizes that 2017 discussion identifying political climate as the major impediment to progress on this issue. It concludes with a framework to guide the path forward.

This paper provides an international perspective to problems, resources and solution pathways with links useful to readers in all countries.