When usage and user satisfaction differ: the case of an electronic discharge summary

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Medical Informatics
• Clinical Information Systems

Background:

• Electronic discharge letters are crucial for patient care continuity.
• Hospital Information Systems (HIS) integration aims to streamline clinical workflows.
• Assessing user satisfaction and system adoption is vital for successful HIS implementation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate system use and user satisfaction with a new electronic discharge letter application.
• To compare findings with a previous study on a HIS-based discharge letter in Austria.
• To understand adoption patterns in a German university hospital's pediatric intensive care unit (PICU).

Main Methods:

• Longitudinal study design over eleven months.
• Utilized system logs to track application usage.
• Employed questionnaires, including the User Interaction Satisfaction Questionnaire (QUIS), to assess user feedback.

Main Results:

• User satisfaction with the electronic discharge letter application was lower compared to a previous Austrian study.
• Despite lower satisfaction, the usage of the new system increased over the study period.
• No mandatory implementation or pressure to switch to the new system was observed.

Conclusions:

• Increased adoption of electronic discharge letter systems may not always correlate with high user satisfaction.
• Further investigation is needed to identify factors influencing user satisfaction in HIS implementations.
• Understanding user experience is critical for optimizing HIS tools in pediatric intensive care settings.