Information retrieval at the point of care of community family physicians in Arab countries

Abstract

This study is based on Jumana Antoun's PhD thesis at Walden University, USA examining the information retrieval behaviour of 72 community family physicians' at the point of care in eight Arab countries in the Eastern Mediterranean. The key findings were that participants looked for digital clinical information at the point of care on average 14.0 times per week with the majority (80.3%) using a mobile phone. Clinical information about medication dosage and side effects was the most sought clinical question, and patient education was the least. Almost half of the participants considered that they often found relevant (55.6%), useful (56.9%) and unbiased (58.3%) information. Whilst none of the factors examined predicted the physicians' self-reported effectiveness and efficiency at information retrieval, the implication for practice points clearly to the barriers and the need for curricula to focus on search strategies using free resources at the point of care.

Efficacy and efficiency of information retrieval of community family physicians at the point of care: exploring the associations with information and computer literacy

“…This study is a part of a cross-sectional, online, anonymous survey-based Ph.D. dissertation study that aimed to understand the characteristics of information retrieval of community family physicians at the point of care in developing countries and its predictors [9]. Community family physicians without academic affiliation in developing countries were targeted as their access to reliable resources or paid point-of-care resources and the Internet in the office may be limited [10][11][12].…”