This appeared last week:
PHRs struggling to gain traction and show benefits - review
2 June 2016
Attempts to create a personal health records suffer from a “lack of quantifiable benefits” and some schemes face an uncertain future if new funding is not found.
A wide ranging review of PHRs, carried out by the Royal College of Physicians’ Health Informatics Unit and funded by NHS England, found that attempts to put more health information in the hands of patients remain at a “relatively low level of maturity.”
It also found that while organisations that had set up PHR projects claimed they had led to meaningful improvements - from fewer hospitalisations to cost savings – these were mostly “assumptions or anecdotal.”
“Many of the case study sites had invested in PHRs on the basis that they are ‘a good thing’, but with little evidence of quantified benefits,” a report released this week says. “The lack of a viable business case could slow further developments and make existing PHRs unsustainable.”
Professor Jeremy Wyatt, who leads the Health Informatics Unit, said there was a clear desire from the public to get more involved in managing their health; but not yet the capacity for providers to deliver.
“Personal health records are a tool that can facilitate this, but at present are only available to restricted groups of patients,” he said. “The evidence shows that more work is required to develop and improve the user experience.”
The report defines personal health records as “a digital tool that helps people to maintain their health and manage their care”; most often by enabling them to access their health record, carry out transactional services, and communicate with medical staff.
Rolling out PHRs across the country is part of the National Information Board’s ‘Personalised Health and Care 2020’ framework to drive improved use of digital technology in healthcare; and some large acute and mental health trusts have invested in developing them.
Lots more here:
Here is the link to the report:
Here are the summary recommendations:
Key recommendations
- There is little information available on the usage of PHRs in the UK, but it appears that the number of both individual users and organisational users is low.
- Although it seems self-evident that patients and service users should have access to their electronic records, how they can do that is currently unclear, as are what data they want to see or which functions they are able to carry out using their PHR.
- At best, there is only anecdotal information on PHR benefits, with little concrete evidence, and funding tends to be short term.
- Where a PHR is used, it tends to be for a very specific purpose with a very specific user base.
- Commonly identified success factors in the adoption of PHRs were: health/care professionals encouraging patients; good communications through multiple channels; support for users at the start (e.g. demonstrating use of PHR).
- It is vital that patients and health/social care professionals are active participants in the design, implementation and appraisal of PHRs.
- The implementation of PHRs has tended to focus on enhancing information sharing and communication. The failure to fully utilise PHRs for health service improvement projects may mean that potential improvements in cost-efficiency and effectiveness are not being realised.
- Further research should seek to understand what patients require from PHRs, along with exploring and piloting projects that utilise the features available within a PHR to deliver health or social care in innovative ways.
- With the anticipated greater use, functionality and complexity of PHRs, sufficient attention must be paid to the design and user interface of these systems to ensure ease of use by, and benefits for, all sectors of the community.
----- End Summary.
There is little reason to think that things are any different in Australia and this all goes to show just how evidence free the PCEHR / myHR is!
David.
Bagikan
The UK Finds That Personal Health Records Are Pretty Much Useless. What A Surprise!
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