Trends indicate 'wise' integrated systems should embrace complementary medicine.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Complementary Therapies↗
SEARCH · Search PubMed
Results for “Health data integration”
Search indexed PubMed citations on genomics, clinical trials, systematic reviews and public health. Explore titles, authors and supplied subject terms, then open the PubMed record.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
Security in perspective; luxury or must?
In this paper, security in health information systems is put into perspective. The further penetration of information technology into health care is discussed and it is concluded that information systems have already become a vital component, not only for the logistics of the health care institution but also for the rendering of care and cure. Health care depends heavily on adequate data, so availability and integrity are equally important. In view of the sensitive nature of many patient data, the importance of confidentiality was recognised long before computers were invented. For widespread use of IT in health care it is of vital importance that computers can be trusted in respect of confidentiality. This paper emphasises the need to pay attention to security and suggests a responsible approach with implementation of both technical and organisational measures.
Computer Security↗
Integrating explainable AI with multiomics systems biology and EHR data mining for personalized drug repurposing in Alzheimer's disease.
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is characterized by region- and patient-specific molecular heterogeneity, which hinders therapeutic design. In this study, we introduce PRISM-ML (PRecision-medicine using Interpretable Systems and Multiomics with Machine Learning), an open-source integrated analysis pipeline that combines interpretable machine learning with systems biology and electronic health record (EHR) data mining to elucidate the molecular diversity of AD and predict promising drug repurposing opportunities. First, we integrated and harmonized transcriptomic (bulk RNA-seq) and genomic (genome-wide association study) data from 2105 brain samples, each with matched data from the same individual (1363 AD patients, 742 controls; nine tissues), sourced from three independent studies. Random forest classifiers with SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) identified patient-specific biomarkers; unsupervised clustering resolved 36 molecularly distinct "subtissues" (clusters of samples); and gene-gene co-expression networks prioritized 262 high-centrality bottleneck genes as putative regulators of dysregulated pathways. Next, knowledge graph-based drug repurposing predicted six FDA-approved drugs that simultaneously target multiple bottleneck genes and multiple AD-relevant pathways. Notably, in a large U.S. de-identified insurance-claims database (n = 364733), exposure to promethazine, one of the candidate drugs, was associated with a 57-62 % lower incidence of AD versus an active antihistamine comparator (adjusted hazard ratio 0.38; inverse-probability weighted 0.43; both p < 0.001), providing real-world support for its repurposing potential. In summary, PRISM-ML, as an explainable multi-omics analysis pipeline, is readily transferable to other complex diseases, advancing precision medicine.
Computational Biology↗
Strategic constraints in health informatics: are expectations realistic?
In response to demands to enhance the efficiency and accountability of health systems, a range of different information technologies are being promoted. These technologies include integrated hospital systems, community health information networks and data repositories. However, the record of such technologies inside and outside the health industry suggest that such technologies cannot necessarily be relied on. The reason identified is that information systems are inherently logical and rational systems, and often come into conflict with the less rational social systems of organizations. Health information is identified in terms of three basic dimensions of information; that associated with managers; with professionals; and, with patients. The information of these dimensions are focused on very different objectives, have different structures and functions and are controlled by very different social processes. The information is also very complex and diverse within the dimensions. In the clinical encounter the clinician draws on specialist expertise, satisfies administrative requirements, and provides a clinical record. Thus, these dimensions converge at that point. However, collecting information is costly, and an efficient service demands economy in data collection. However, the technologies being promoted demand 'complete' data acquisition based on consistent and stable data definitions and data structures. The article argues that there is, thus, a conflict between the requirements of these technologies, and the realities of providing efficient services within a changing organizational, professional and social environment.
Clinical Medicine↗
A framework for the integration of ecosystem and human health in public policy: two case studies with infectious agents.
Despite that a significant body of published literature exists in the complex area of interconnection among the environment, ecosystems, and human activity, relatively little attention has been paid to the integration and analysis of ecological and human health data in the form of a conceptual model. Human and ecological health protection generally have been treated as separate domains of policy, with significant differences in both the analytic methods used to characterize risks and the policies developed for risk reduction. Understanding the relationships among population growth, development, natural resource use, the environment, human health, and ecosystems is an important area of both scientific inquiry and environmental policy. The present paper focuses on the development of a conceptual model for understanding disease causation, particularly infectious disease, and the implications of such a model for public policy. The conceptual model incorporates ecological and human health risk assessment information applied to case studies of two infectious diseases. This article takes an initial step toward formalizing the conceptual model so that research and assessment procedures can be developed.
Agriculture↗
Audit of surgical audit.
A clinical audit, run by surgeons with modest clerical assistance, has been incorporated into the routine clinical practice of all hospitals in a large health authority. Data on operations and deaths are integrated into routine clinical recording, and feedback is by annual report containing statistical analyses and critical commentaries and by discussions with colleagues. The results of the first five years show statistically significant falls in the number of reoperations for intra-abdominal complications, retained gallstones, arterial grafts, and amputations and in operative mortality following surgery for benign biliary and pancreatic disease, resection of large bowel for benign disease, operations on aortic aneurysms, and arterial grafts except for aneurysms. Although the audit was designed originally for monitoring and improving quality of care, other uses include monitoring of increasing specialisation and changes in clinical practice, planning surgical services and postgraduate training, and showing the effects of changes in the availability of resources.
Clinical Competence↗
Preventing pressure ulcers among wheelchair users: preliminary comments on the development of a self-administered risk assessment tool.
The prevalence of pressure ulcers among permanent wheelchair users remains high. While many risk factors for pressure ulcer development in this group have been identified only a minority of these have been evaluated scientifically and it is generally acknowledged that existing risk assessment tools are inadequate for predicting risk in seated persons who use a wheelchair for mobility. A 2-year prospective study is underway to design a new self-administered pressure ulcer risk indicator to be used by non-ambulant wheelchair users and their carers in conjunction with professionals. This instrument will be designed as a result of triangulation of methods. A systematic review of available evidence Latest professional opinion A qualitative study exploring the issues from the perspective of seated persons with a history of pressure ulcers (n = 10) undertaken by one of the authors (JW) A 2-year prospective study identifying key risk factors in a sample of 160 seated persons. This paper offers an insight into the findings on the recruitment of the 160 individuals into the prospective study, which is currently collecting a large amount of data on the health, degree of disability and integrity of skin of all the participants. The paper offers an overview of the medical diagnosis, degree of physical disability, issues pertaining to continence and prevalence of pressure ulcers in this group on recruitment. Early findings suggest that the new risk indicator should include measures of degree of physical disability and ability to transfer as an integral part of self-assessment and therefore prevention of pressure ulcers. The study was due for completion in the autumn of 2002. It is envisaged that early work on the development of the tool should be complete by the summer of 2003.
Adult↗
Cost-effectivenes of paclitaxel plus cisplatin in advanced non-small-cell lung cancer.
The aim of this study was to assess the cost-effectiveness of combination chemotherapy with paclitaxel/cisplatin, compared with standard etoposide/cisplatin in patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). We obtained the primary survival and resource utilization data from a large three-arm randomized trial comparing: paclitaxel 135 mg m(-2) by 24-h intravenous (i.v.) infusion + cisplatin; paclitaxel 250 mg m(-2) by 24-h i.v. infusion + cisplatin + granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF); and standard etoposide/cisplatin in patients with stage IIIb or IV NSCLC. We also modelled the regimens with paclitaxel 135 mg m(-2) + cisplatin administered as an outpatient by 3-h infusion, as clinical data suggest that this is equivalent to 24-h infusion. We collected costing data from the Ottawa Regional Cancer Centre and applied it to the resources consumed in the randomized trial. We integrated these data into the Statistics Canada POpulation HEalth Model (POHEM), which generated hypothetical cohorts of patients treated with each regimen. The POHEM model assigned diagnostic work-up, treatment, disease progression and survival characteristics to each individual in these cohorts and tabulated the costs associated with each. We did sensitivity analyses around the costs of chemotherapy and its administration, and the survival differences between the two regimens. All costs are in 1997 Canadian dollars ($1.00 Canadian approximately Pound 0.39 sterling). The perspective is that of the Canadian health care system. In the trial, the two paclitaxel-containing arms had almost identical survival curves with a median survival of 9.7 months compared with 7.4 months for etoposide/cisplatin. As administered in the trial, paclitaxel/cisplatin cost $76,370 per life-year gained (LYG) and paclitaxel/cisplatin/G-CSF $138,578 per LYG relative to etoposide/cisplatin. However, when modelled as an outpatient 3-h infusion, paclitaxel/cisplatin was moderately cost-effective at $30,619 per LYG. When compared with historical controls treated with best supportive care, this regimen of paclitaxel/cisplatin cost $4539 per LYG. Assuming a 3-h paclitaxel infusion yields the same survival advantage as the 24-h infusion did in the randomized trial, paclitaxel/cisplatin is a cost-effective improvement over standard etoposide/cisplatin for patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer.
Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols↗
Utilization of hospital resources.
A population-based approach was used to analyze the utilization patterns of hospital care by Manitoba residents during the fiscal year 1991/1992. Patterns were analyzed for eight administrative regions, with use assigned to the patient's region of residence, regardless of the location of the hospitalization. Regional boundaries consistent with those used for presentation of data on health status and socioeconomic risk permitted integration of findings across the Population Health Information System. Marked differences in acute hospital use were found. Residents of the urban Winnipeg ("good health") region had the lowest rates of use of acute care overall, and northern rural ("poor health") regions had significantly higher rates of use. However, almost one half of hospital days by Winnipeg residents were used in long-stay care (60+ days), while rural residents were more likely to use short-stay hospital care. Despite a concentration of surgical specialists in Winnipeg, there were only small regional differences in overall rates of surgery.
Adult↗
The DPACS project at the University of Trieste.
The DPACS project (Data and Picture Archiving and Communication System) was undertaken at the University of Trieste by the Institute of Radiology and the DEEI (Dipartimento di Elettrotecnica, Elettronica ed Informatica), in collaboration with the CRSTBS (Centro Ricerche e Studi Tecnologie Biomediche Sanitarie) of the Area Science Park and the Azienda Ospedaliera of Trieste. The main objective of this project is to create an open system for the management of clinical data and images and for the integration of health care services. The first phase is oriented toward finding an implementation strategy for the creation of a prototype DPACS system, to serve as a starting point for the realization of a distributed structure for the extension of the service, firstly to the entire structure of the Cattinara Hospital and subsequently to all the Public Health units in Trieste. After local testing, the service will finally be expanded to a wider geographical level. The intensive computerization of the Institute of Radiology furnished the most favourable environment for the verification of the prototype, as the service provided by the existing RIS (Radiology Information System) and PACS (Picture and Archiving Communication System) has long been consolidated. One of the main goals of the project, in particular, is to replace the old, by now obsolete, PACS with the DPACS services.
Humans↗
A bedside PC charting system for nursing students using Clinical Care Classification (CCC) System.
This study tested a PC based version of the CCC System on students' performance of charting patient care plans. The application was designed for any PC with Windows and Microsoft Office(r) programs. The PC based system was tested in a randomized trial with the control group using a type-in text-based only system also mounted on the bedside computer. The results demonstrate that the application is efficient and effective for nursing care charting using the nursing process and capturing patient care information with a language that is standardized and ready for integration with other patient electronic health record (E.H.R) data.
Humans↗
How hyper are we? A look at hypermedia management in academic health sciences libraries.
Advances in instruction-delivery technology have a direct impact on academic media centers. New technology challenges librarians philosophically, financially, and ethically to provide access to information and instructional systems. Each institution has a unique set of circumstances governing decisions to provide access to hypermedia. If patron needs are met satisfactorily through labs outside the library, it may not be necessary for the library to incorporate hypermedia into its collection. Other library media centers may serve as a main point of access, or a substantial alternative computing resource may exist in departments or professional schools. Regardless of which route is taken, hypermedia is a viable instructional delivery system and can coexist with traditional services. Future studies on various aspects of hypermedia and multimedia management should be encouraged. Academic health sciences librarians would benefit from the study of hypermedia and multimedia collection-development policies, equipment, and personnel management. As computer networking of multimedia and image databases becomes available, it will be interesting to see the role academic health sciences libraries assume in integrating these data-bases with traditional information-delivery systems. Changing technology and instructional methods will affect budgets as well as library relationships with academic departments and computing centers.
Computer Communication Networks↗
Mary J. Nielubowicz Award. Bringing nurses on-line: implementing nursing informatics.
Processing the vast amount of information required to provide quality nursing and health care today is an immense task. The Surgeon General of the Navy recently updated the Department's "Vision for the Future." He challenged Navy medicine to become a leader in technology integration. Shifting toward a managed-care environment makes it imperative for health care organizations and their personnel to integrate data, information, and systems at all levels. Implementation of a coordinator to assist nursing users with this technology is proving essential. This essay describes how one nursing directorate at a Naval hospital implemented a full-time staff member as Nursing Informatics Coordinator to serve in this role. Receiving and using data and information in the practice of nursing is vital to the profession. Specific factors identifying the reasons for development of this role, impact achieved, opportunities encountered, and the future of the position are addressed.
Awards and Prizes↗
Homelessness among persons with serious mental illness in an enhanced community-based mental health system.
OBJECTIVE: Homelessness and patterns of service use were examined among seriously mentally ill persons in an area with a well-funded community-based mental health system. METHODS: The sample consisted of 438 individuals referred between 1990 and 1992 to an extended acute care psychiatric hospital after a stay in a general hospital. Those experiencing an episode of homelessness, defined as an admission to a public shelter between 1990 and 1993, were compared with those who were residentially stable. Data from a longitudinal integrated database of public mental health and medical services were used to construct service utilization measures to test the mediating effect of outpatient mental health care on preventing homelessness. RESULTS: A homelessness rate of 24 percent was found among the 438 persons with serious mental illness. Those who experienced homelessness were more likely to be African American, receive general assistance, and have a comorbid substance abuse problem. They used significantly more inpatient psychiatric, emergency, and health care services than the subjects who did not become homeless. Forty to 50 percent of the homeless group received outpatient care during the year before and after their shelter episode. The number of persons who received intensive case management services increased after shelter admission. CONCLUSIONS: An enhanced community-based mental health system was not sufficient to prevent homelessness among high-risk persons with serious mental illness. Eleven percent of this group experienced homelessness after referral to an extended acute care facility. Strategies to prevent homelessness should be considered, perhaps at the time of discharge from the referring community hospital or extended acute care facility.
Acute Disease↗
Beyond compliance: environmental health problem solving, interagency collaboration, and risk assessment to prevent waterborne disease outbreaks.
A systems approach to environmental health problem solving was used to investigate two waterborne norovirus outbreaks in Wyoming and can serve in the development of improved prevention strategies. An interagency collaboration to prevent waterborne disease involving local, state, and federal partners was designed to coordinate response to outbreak investigations. Improved risk assessment and reporting procedures were also integrated to ensure better availability of necessary data. Public health entities should implement sustainable intersectoral interventions to prevent waterborne disease that not only improve regulatory compliance but also have a positive impact on community health outcomes. Collaborative preventive health and water system protection activities should receive priority attention for implementation in state and local jurisdictions.
Cooperative Behavior↗
Issues in identification and linkage of patient records across an integrated delivery system.
Historically, the health information systems community has viewed linking personal records as a mundane task. The oversimplified view that routine database manipulation can accurately identify multiple records for a single individual is erroneous, an assumption based on a misperception of the quality of the underlying data. Such data have been adversely affected by the evolution of individual facility patient indexes from multiple systems and the results of backload procedures, and the lack of focus on the need for data integrity by users of the automated systems. Much of the random, invalid data we identify on a daily basis is directly associated with the need for system users to place data in the patient record while they face the situation of having no obvious data field in which to place them. Combined with an underlying lack of standards for the collection of personal identification information, this results in pure chaos when reviewing an MPI file containing a million records at the start of a linkage evaluation project. We have documented the considerable effort that must therefore be made in standardizing the MPI files using stringent analytical procedures and applying common edit routines before commencing record linkage. This preprocessing effort must then be supplemented with sophisticated matching procedures that can handle the dual challenge of minimizing false negatives (the failure to identify true linkages) and false positives (the incorrect linking of records that do not represent the same person). The identification of pairs of linked records does not, however, complete an EPI loading. Because it is fairly common for a multiple facility linkage evaluation to identify more than two medical record numbers for the same patient, and the primary goal of an EPI is to assign a unique identifier for the patient which will link that patient's multiple files, it becomes necessary to develop a means of readily associating three or more records for the same patient. One approach we have used with great success is to assign a common, sequential identification number to all linked medical record numbers for the same patient regardless of facility. The assignment of linkage identification numbers is computer-intensive and is generally accomplished with a highly iterative process. Both system memory and hard disk resources are fully tested as the number of good linkages in an overlap evaluation reaches the half-million mark or greater. Because the primary linkage analysis goal is to develop linkages on pairs of records, with confidence levels based on the comparison of information for those two records, thresholds must be set to decide which linkages should be accepted as true without any human evaluation. If the threshold is set too low, the defined linkage groups may incorrectly join the medical record numbers for different persons. But if the threshold is set too high, there will be undesired duplication of persons in the enterprise system. As in the identification of the underlying linkage pairs, the development of a confidence measure greatly facilitates the assignment of the unique identification numbers needed in the EPI implementation.
Algorithms↗
Triangulation research among culturally diverse populations.
There exists an ongoing challenge in the health sciences to develop research methods that effectively describe patterns of health beliefs and actions in different cultures. While the dominant framework for research has traditionally been the quantitative paradigm, qualitative methods place more emphasis on holistic descriptions of the human phenomena and thus may be more appropriate for transcultural research. Triangulation offers an alternative for investigators studying transcultural health by integrating the inherent strengths of both quantitative and qualitative data while minimizing their limitations. This article discusses six approaches for employing triangulation research in transcultural health.
Cultural Diversity↗
Autonomy and integrity: upholding older adult patients' dignity.
AIM: The aim of this study was to deepen understanding of the relationship between autonomy and integrity in interactions between patients and individual health care workers in real-life care situations. METHOD: The data reported here are from a 6- and 12-month follow-up of the teaching of ethics to health care professionals working with older people. The data collection method used was participant observation. Health professionals' caring behaviour in everyday situations was observed from the point of view of patients' autonomy and integrity. Theoretical frameworks relating to autonomy and integrity were used to analyse the data. FINDINGS: The structural framework was useful for identifying the two concepts and their relationship in everyday situations. The data suggest that the two concepts are ethically complex. Autonomy is grounded in respect for patients' ability to choose, decide and take responsibility for their own lives. Autonomy varies within and between individuals and is dependent on context and on those involved. It stresses the intrinsic value of patients, which marks their worth independently of others. Integrity, however, is bound to patients' very existence, no matter what their physical and mental conditions, and must be respected regardless of their ability to act autonomously. CONCLUSION: The concepts of autonomy and integrity appear to presuppose one another and to be indivisible if older adult patients' dignity is to be maintained. This implies that when patients' autonomy is supported their integrity is protected and, consequently, their dignity upheld.
Adult↗