Due to the high degree of care fragmentation, there is an obvious need for HIE for Austrian DM patients. Both, the SEHRS as well as ELGA could provide a substantial contribution to informational continuity of care in Austrian DM treatment. Hospitals and specialists would have gained the most amount of external information, primary care providers and pharmacies would have at least doubled their available information. Despite being the most important potential feeders of a national Shared EHR system according to our analysis, primary care providers will not tap their full corresponding potential under the current implementation scenario of ELGA.
ObjectiveTo demonstrate that when investigating the relevance of continuity of care for patient outcomes, different definitions can lead to contradicting results.MethodsWe used claims data from the regional public health insurer of Lower Austria covering the period from 2008 to 2011. The study sample included subjects with repeated dispensings of anti-diabetic drugs. The continuity of care index was calculated firstly based on a patient’s contacts with general practitioners (primary COCI) and secondly based on contacts at all medical disciplines (total COCI). The association of the two continuity of care measures with mortality was assessed in separate univariable and multivariable Cox regression models.ResultsOur study sample consisted of 51,717 patients with a median observation time of 3.65 years. The data showed that a high total COCI was associated with increased mortality, while there was no association between primary COCI and mortality.ConclusionsMeasures of continuity of care are highly sensitive to the type of medical disciplines taken into account. The continuity of care index calculated from contacts at all medical disciplines might measure diversity rather than continuity of care.
Shared electronic health records (EHRs) systems can offer a complete medication overview of the prescriptions of different health care providers. We use health claims data of more than 1 million Austrians in 2006 and 2007 with 27 million prescriptions to estimate the effect of shared EHR systems on drug-drug interaction (DDI) and duplication warnings detection and prevention. The Austria Codex and the ATC/DDD information were used as a knowledge base to detect possible DDIs. DDIs are categorized as severe, moderate, and minor interactions. In comparison to the current situation where only DDIs between drugs issued by a single health care provider can be checked, the number of warnings increases significantly if all drugs of a patient are checked: severe DDI warnings would be detected for 20% more persons, and the number of severe DDI warnings and duplication warnings would increase by 17%. We show that not only do shared EHR systems help to detect more patients with warnings but DDIs are also detected more frequently. Patient safety can be increased using shared EHR systems.
Background Health information exchange (HIE) among care providers who cooperate in the treatment of patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) has been rated as an important aspect of successful care. Patient-sharing relations among care providers permit inferences about corresponding information-sharing relations. Objectives This study aimed to obtain information for an effective HIE platform design to be used in DM care by analyzing patient-sharing relations among various types of care providers (ToCPs), such as hospitals, pharmacies, and different outpatient specialists, within a nationwide claims dataset of Austrian DM patients. We focus on 2 parameters derived from patient-sharing networks: (1) the principal HIE partners of the different ToCPs involved in the treatment of DM and (2) the required participation rate of ToCPs in HIE platforms for the purpose of effective communication. Methods The claims data of 7.9 million Austrian patients from 2006 to 2007 served as our data source. DM patients were identified by their medication. We established metrics for the quantification of our 2 parameters of interest. The principal HIE partners were derived from the portions of a care provider’s patient-sharing relations with different ToCPs. For the required participation rate of ToCPs in an HIE platform, we determine the concentration of patient-sharing relations among ToCPs. Our corresponding metrics are derived in analogy from existing work for the quantification of the continuity of care. Results We identified 324,703 DM patients treated by 12,226 care providers; the latter were members of 16 ToCPs. On the basis of their score for 2 of our parameters, we categorized the ToCPs into low , medium , and high . For the most important HIE partner parameter, pharmacies, general practitioners (GPs), and laboratories were the representatives of the top group, that is, our care providers shared the highest numbers of DM patients with these ToCPs. For the required participation rate of type of care provide (ToCP) in HIE platform parameter, the concentration of DM patient-sharing relations with a ToCP tended to be inversely related to the ToCPs member count. Conclusions We conclude that GPs, pharmacies, and laboratories should be core members of any HIE platform that supports DM care, as they are the most important DM patient-sharing partners. We further conclude that, for implementing HIE with ToCPs who have many members (in Austria, particularly GPs and pharmacies), an HIE solution with high participation rates from these ToCPs (ideally a nationwide HIE platform with obligatory participation of the concerned ToCPs) seems essential. This will raise the probability of HIE being achieved with any care provider of these ToCPs. As chronic diseases are rising because of a...
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