eHealth updates - 7 March 2013

New policy, guidance and e-health initiatives from across the UK. For more information about the e-health theme see Quality and Safety e-Bulletin: e-health.

Some of the resources linked to are in PDF format - see how to access PDF files.

BMC: Medical Informatics and Decision Making: Cost effectiveness of a computer-delivered intervention to improve HIV medication adherence. High levels of adherence to medications for HIV infection are essential for optimal clinical outcomes and to reduce viral transmission, but many patients do not achieve required levels. This study concludes that "computer-delivered adherence interventions may be a cost-effective strategy to improve adherence in persons treated for HIV". 

BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making: Predicting out of intensive care unit cardiopulmonary arrest or death using electronic medical record data. The study concludes that an automated model harnessing EMR data offers great potential for identifying RED (a composite of resuscitation events and death) and was superior to both a prior risk model and the human judgment-driven Rapid Response Team (RRT).

BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making: Internet-enabled pulmonary rehabilitation and diabetes education in group settings at home: a preliminary study of patient acceptability. This study, undertaken in Norway, aimed to assess patient acceptability of the delivery form and components of internet-enabled programmes based on home groups for comprehensive pulmonary rehabilitation and for diabetes self-management education.

British Medical Journal (BMJ): Effect of telehealth on quality of life and psychological outcomes over 12 months (Whole Systems Demonstrator telehealth questionnaire study): nested study of patient reported outcomes in a pragmatic, cluster randomised controlled trial. This trial assessed the effect of second generation, home based telehealth on health related quality of life, anxiety, and depressive symptoms over 12 months in patients with long term conditions. It found that differences between treatment groups were small and non-significant for all outcomes. Telehealth did not improve quality of life or psychological outcomes for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, or heart failure over 12 months. These findings suggest that home based telehealth was not effective compared with usual care only.

Compassion in Practice: Compassion in Practice supporting nursing staff survey. Compassion in Practice is exploring ways in which they can best support nurses, midwives and care staff using social media and virtual, online networks. Help them do this by completing a short online survey, which closes on 15 March 2013.

DH: New guidance to bring confidence and reassurance to patients. This guidance was created by the Department of Health, working in collaboration with BCS, the Chartered Institute of IT in 2013. It will help people understand what an electronic health and care record is, how they can access it, who they may want to share it with and how to perform these actions securely. It has been written for people who are accessing their own records and who may want to share them with others and does not include specific advice if they are using records on behalf of someone else who can’t do it themselves (for example, for children or someone who needs support to make decisions). Patient guidance summary booklets are also available.
Guidance: Keeping your online health and social care records safe and secure (PDF 394KB).
NHS Choices: Health records.

Ehi 2013 Awards: Healthcare IT champion of the year. eHealth Insider are looking for a Healthcare IT Champion of the year 2013. This is an opportunity to recognise the achievements of an individual who has made an outstanding contribution in the past year to promoting healthcare.

European Commission: Active and healthy ageing - For you and with you (PDF 1.9MB). This new brochure has been published by the European Commission to highlight the challenges and opportunities of today and tomorrow related to demographic ageing in Europe. Prepared by the Directorate-General Communication Networks, Content and Technology, within the Digital Agenda for Europe strategy, the brochure presents a selection of EU-funded IT solutions developed to improve the health and quality of lives of older people.

Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR): Recruitment to online therapies for depression: pilot cluster randomized controlled trial. Practitioners should consider online advertising to increase uptake of online therapy but need to check its additional value. A cluster RCT using location targeted adverts is feasible and this research design provides the best evidence of cost-effectiveness.

JMIR: Utilizing social media to study information-seeking and ethical issues in gene therapy. This study utilised social media to investigate the kind of information public users are seeking about gene therapy and the hopes, concerns, and attitudes they express.

NHS Commissioning Board (NHS CB) Securing excellence in IT Services’ (PDF 358KB). This sets out how the management of IT systems will be organised for offender health care from April 2013. 

NHS Connecting for Health (NHS CFH): Guidance for nurses: Patient access to records online. This guidance provides an overview of the benefits and issues for online patient record access and lists some examples of good practice.

NHS CFH: NHS Number use – National Nursing Informatics Strategic Taskforce (NNIST) position statement. NHS Number use describes the National Nursing Informatics Strategic Taskforce (NNIST) position on why NNIST believes that use of the NHS number is safety critical and is a professional responsibility for all nurses and midwives. The NHS number is the unique number issued to every parson registered with the NHS in England and Wales.

NHS Scotland eHealth: Strategies. NHS Scotland have published the Person-centred eHealth strategy and delivery plan, part of the framework of strategic documents that underpin the delivery of the eHealth Strategy and putting people at the heart of the healthcare process.

Scottish Centre for Telehealth and Telecare (SCTT): Webcasts. The SCTT have released two webcasts which describe ongoing research with heart failure and multiple sclerosis service users. They explain the research underway and how technology is being tested as a method of delivering tailored support. These different technology applications have relevance to many long term conditions and the presenters make interesting points about the importance of tailoring content, staff involvement and ongoing support. To access a webcast follow the link  then click on the Eventcasts tab. A mix of short (20 min) and longer (40 min) webcasts will be available each month.

Scottish Government: Digital Scotland 2020: Achieving world-class digital infrastructure: a final report to the Scottish Government. This independent report provides an assessment of: what world-class looks like elsewhere, the characteristics of those countries and regions that have or are delivering world-class digital infrastructure; and what lessons could be learned and applied to Scotland in order for it to be world-class. Five case studies were chosen – Australia, Ireland, South Korea, Lithuania and Sweden – on the basis of their visions and achievements with respect to digital infrastructure and the digital society, and the lessons they can provide for what Scotland should consider or avoid going forward.