Desiderata for personal electronic communication in clinical systems

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Medical Communication Systems
• Telemedicine

Background:

• Electronic communication between clinicians and patients is crucial in modern healthcare.
• Evaluating and selecting personal clinical electronic communication (PCEC) systems presents significant challenges, especially for institutions new to these technologies.
• The clinical context adds unique complexities to the adoption of PCEC systems.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify key characteristics for personal clinical electronic communication (PCEC) systems based on potential user input.
• To develop a list of desired features (desiderata) for PCEC systems.
• To evaluate existing PCEC systems against these identified features.

Main Methods:

• Consultation with potential users from a national telemedicine project to define PCEC system characteristics.
• Compilation of a desiderata list outlining desired features for PCEC systems.
• Evaluation of two conventional email systems and three Web-based PCEC systems against the defined desiderata.

Main Results:

• Web-based PCEC systems consistently outperformed conventional email implementations in user-defined evaluations.
• Specific desired features for PCEC systems were identified through user consultation.
• A clear preference emerged for Web-based solutions over traditional email in a clinical context.

Conclusions:

• Web-based PCEC systems offer a more effective solution for electronic communication in clinical settings compared to conventional email.
• The study provides a framework for evaluating PCEC systems based on user-centric features.
• Further discussion and research into PCEC system features and evaluation methodologies are encouraged.