| 1. |
- Bärkås, Annika, et al.
(författare)
-
Patients' Access to Their Psychiatric Records : A Comparison of Four Countries
- 2022
-
Ingår i: Challenges of Trustable AI and Added-Value on Health. - Amsterdam; Berlin; Washington, DC : IOS Press. - 9781643682846 - 9781643682853 ; 294, s. 510-514
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Several Nordic and Baltic countries are forerunners in the digitalization of patient ehealth services and have since long implemented psychiatric records as parts of the ehealth services. There are country-specific differences in what clinical information is offered to patients concerning their online patient accessible psychiatric records. This study explores national differences in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Estonia in patient access to their psychiatric records. Data was collected through a socio-technical data collection template developed during a workshop series and then analyzed in a cross-country comparison focusing on items related to psychiatry records online. The results show that psychiatric records online are offered to patients in all four countries, and provide the same functionality and similar psychiatry information. Overall, the conclusion is that experiences of various functionalities should be scrutinized to promote transparency of psychiatric records as part of the national eHealth services to increase equality of care and patient empowerment.
|
|
| 2. |
|
|
| 3. |
- Fagerlund, Asbjørn Johansen, et al.
(författare)
-
Experiences from patients in mental healthcare accessing their electronic health records : results from a cross-national survey in Estonia, Finland, Norway, and Sweden
- 2024
-
Ingår i: BMC Psychiatry. - : BioMed Central Ltd. - 1471-244X. ; 24:1
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Patients’ online record access (ORA) enables patients to read and use their health data through online digital solutions. One such solution, patient-accessible electronic health records (PAEHRs) have been implemented in Estonia, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. While accumulated research has pointed to many potential benefits of ORA, its application in mental healthcare (MHC) continues to be contested. The present study aimed to describe MHC users’ overall experiences with national PAEHR services. Methods: The study analysed the MHC-part of the NORDeHEALTH 2022 Patient Survey, a large-scale multi-country survey. The survey consisted of 45 questions, including demographic variables and questions related to users’ experiences with ORA. We focused on the questions concerning positive experiences (benefits), negative experiences (errors, omissions, offence), and breaches of security and privacy. Participants were included in this analysis if they reported receiving mental healthcare within the past two years. Descriptive statistics were used to summarise data, and percentages were calculated on available data. Results: 6,157 respondents were included. In line with previous research, almost half (45%) reported very positive experiences with ORA. A majority in each country also reported improved trust (at least 69%) and communication (at least 71%) with healthcare providers. One-third (29.5%) reported very negative experiences with ORA. In total, half of the respondents (47.9%) found errors and a third (35.5%) found omissions in their medical documentation. One-third (34.8%) of all respondents also reported being offended by the content. When errors or omissions were identified, about half (46.5%) reported that they took no action. There seems to be differences in how patients experience errors, omissions, and missing information between the countries. A small proportion reported instances where family or others demanded access to their records (3.1%), and about one in ten (10.7%) noted that unauthorised individuals had seen their health information. Conclusions: Overall, MHC patients reported more positive experiences than negative, but a large portion of respondents reported problems with the content of the PAEHR. Further research on best practice in implementation of ORA in MHC is therefore needed, to ensure that all patients may reap the benefits while limiting potential negative consequences.
|
|
| 4. |
- Hagström, Josefin, et al.
(författare)
-
Minor and Parental Access to Electronic Health Records : Differences Across Four Countries
- 2022
-
Ingår i: Challenges of Trustable AI and Added-Value on Health. - : IOS Press. - 9781643682846 - 9781643682853 ; 294, s. 495-499
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- An increasing number of countries are implementing patient access to electronic health records (EHR). However, EHR access for parents, children and adolescents presents ethical challenges of data integrity, and regulations vary across providers, regions, and countries. In the present study, we compare EHR access policy for parents, children and adolescents in four countries. Documentation from three areas: upper age limit of minors for which parents have access; age at which minors obtain access; and possibilities of access restriction and extension was collected from Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Estonia. Results showed that while all systems provided parents with automatic proxy access, age limits for its expiry differed. Furthermore, a lower minimum age than 18 for adolescent access was present in two of four countries. Differences between countries and potential implications for adolescents are discussed. We conclude that experiences of various approaches should be explored to promote the development of EHR regulations for parents, children and adolescents that increases safety, quality, and equality of care.
|
|
| 5. |
- Hagström, Josefin, et al.
(författare)
-
Minors' and guardian access to and use of a national patient portal : A retrospective comparative case study of Sweden and Finland.
- 2024
-
Ingår i: International Journal of Medical Informatics. - 1386-5056 .- 1872-8243. ; 187
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- BACKGROUND: Approaches to implementing online record access (ORA) via patient portals for minors and guardians vary internationally, as more countries continue to develop patient-accessible electronic health records (PAEHR) systems. Evidence of ORA usage and country-specific practices to allow or block minors' and guardians' access to minors' records during adolescence (i.e. access control practices) may provide a broader understanding of possible approaches and their implications for minors' confidentiality and guardian support.AIM: To describe and compare minors' and guardian proxy users' PAEHR usage in Sweden and Finland. Furthermore, to investigate the use of country-specific access control practices.METHODS: A retrospective, observational case study was conducted. Data were collected from PAEHR administration services in Sweden and Finland and proportional use was calculated based on population statistics. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the results.RESULTS: In both Sweden and Finland, the proportion of adolescents accessing their PAEHR increased from younger to older age-groups reaching the proportion of 59.9 % in Sweden and 84.8 % in Finland in the age-group of 17-year-olds. The PAEHR access gap during early adolescence in Sweden may explain the lower proportion of users among those who enter adulthood. Around half of guardians in Finland accessed their minor children's records in 2022 (46.1 %), while Swedish guardian use was the highest in 2022 for newborn children (41.8 %), and decreased thereafter. Few, mainly guardians, applied for extended access in Sweden. In Finland, where a case-by-case approach to access control relies on healthcare professionals' (HCPs) consideration of a minor's maturity, 95.8 % of minors chose to disclose prescription information to their guardians.CONCLUSION: While age-based access control practices can hamper ORA for minors and guardians, case-by-case approach requires HCP resources and careful guidance to ensure equality between patients. Guardians primarily access minors' records during early childhood and adolescents show willingness to share their PAEHR with parents.
|
|
| 6. |
|
|
| 7. |
- Hägglund, Maria, Lektor, 1975-, et al.
(författare)
-
A Nordic Perspective on Patient Online Record Access and the European Health Data Space
- 2024
-
Ingår i: Journal of Medical Internet Research. - : JMIR Publications Inc.. - 1438-8871. ; 26:1
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Nordic countries are, together with the United States, forerunners in online record access (ORA), which has now become widespread. The importance of accessible and structured health data has also been highlighted by policy makers internationally. To ensure the full realization of ORA’s potential in the short and long term, there is a pressing need to study ORA from a cross-disciplinary, clinical, humanistic, and social sciences perspective that looks beyond strictly technical aspects. In this viewpoint paper, we explore the policy changes in the European Health Data Space (EHDS) proposal to advance ORA across the European Union, informed by our research in a Nordic-led project that carries out the first of its kind, large-scale international investigation of patients’ ORA—NORDeHEALTH (Nordic eHealth for Patients: Benchmarking and Developing for the Future). We argue that the EHDS proposal will pave the way for patients to access and control third-party access to their electronic health records. In our analysis of the proposal, we have identified five key principles for ORA: (1) the right to access, (2) proxy access, (3) patient input of their own data, (4) error and omission rectification, and (5) access control. ORA implementation today is fragmented throughout Europe, and the EHDS proposal aims to ensure all European citizens have equal online access to their health data. However, we argue that in order to implement the EHDS, we need more research evidence on the key ORA principles we have identified in our analysis. Results from the NORDeHEALTH project provide some of that evidence, but we have also identified important knowledge gaps that still need further exploration.
|
|
| 8. |
- Hägglund, Maria, et al.
(författare)
-
NORDeHEALTH – Learning from the Nordic Experiences of Patient Online Record Access
- 2023
-
Ingår i: Journal of Medical Internet Research. - : JMIR Publications. - 1438-8871.
-
Tidskriftsartikel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Nordic countries are forerunners in online record access (ORA) which has now become widespread. The importance of accessible and structured health data has also been highlighted by policymakers internationally. To ensure the full realization of ORA’spotential in the short and long term, there is a pressing need to study ORA from a cross-disciplinary, technical, clinical, humanistic, and social sciences perspective that looks beyond strictly technical aspects. In this viewpoint paper, we explore the policy changes in the European Health Data Space (EHDS) proposal to advance ORA across the European Union, and introduce a Nordic-led research project that carries out the first of its kind, large-scale international investigation of patients’ ORA; NORDeHEALTH. We argue that the EHDS proposal will pave the way for patients to access and control third-party access to their electronic health records (EHRs). This will have implications within Europe and globally as it will further extend the boundaries for accessing and using EHRs for primary and secondary data use. Research such as that led by the NORDeHEALTH project is essential in guiding the design and implementation of solutions to meet the requirements of the EHDS proposal. Further international collaboration and research are needed to ensure that socio-technical and contextual factors are considered to ensure successful and secure implementation.
|
|
| 9. |
- Hägglund, Maria, Lektor, 1975-, et al.
(författare)
-
The NORDeHEALTH 2022 Patient Survey : Cross-Sectional Study of National Patient Portal Users in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia
- 2023
-
Ingår i: Journal of Medical Internet Research. - : JMIR Publications. - 1438-8871. ; 25
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- BACKGROUND: Although many surveys have been conducted on patients accessing their own health records in recent years, there is a limited amount of nationwide cross-country data available on patients' views and preferences. To address this gap, an international survey of patient users was conducted in the Nordic eHealth project, NORDeHEALTH. OBJECTIVE: We aimed to investigate the sociodemographic characteristics and experiences of patients who accessed their electronic health records (EHRs) through national patient portals in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia. METHODS: A cross-sectional web-based survey was distributed using the national online health portals. The target participants were patients who accessed the national patient portals at the start of 2022 and who were aged ≥15 years. The survey included a mixture of close-ended and free-text questions about participant sociodemographics, usability experience, experiences with health care and the EHR, reasons for reading health records online, experience with errors, omissions and offense, opinions about security and privacy, and the usefulness of portal functions. In this paper, we summarized the data on participant demographics, past experience with health care, and the patient portal through descriptive statistics. RESULTS: In total, 29,334 users completed the survey, of which 9503 (32.40%) were from Norway, 13,008 (44.35%) from Sweden, 4713 (16.07%) from Finland, and 2104 (7.17%) from Estonia. National samples were comparable according to reported gender, with about two-thirds identifying as women (19,904/29,302, 67.93%). Age distributions were similar across the countries, but Finland had older users while Estonia had younger users. The highest attained education and presence of health care education varied among the national samples. In all 4 countries, patients most commonly rated their health as "fair" (11,279/29,302, 38.48%). In Estonia, participants were more often inclined to rate their health positively, whereas Norway and Sweden had the highest proportion of negative health ratings. Across the whole sample, most patients received some care in the last 2 years (25,318/29,254, 86.55%). Mental health care was more common (6214/29,254, 21.24%) than oncological care (3664/29,254, 12.52%). Overall, most patients had accessed their health record "2 to 9 times" (11,546/29,306, 39.4%), with the most frequent users residing in Sweden, where about one-third of patients accessed it "more than 20 times" (4571/13,008, 35.14%). CONCLUSIONS: This is the first large-scale international survey to compare patient users' sociodemographics and experiences with accessing their EHRs. Although the countries are in close geographic proximity and demonstrate similar advancements in giving their residents online records access, patient users in this survey differed. We will continue to investigate patients' experiences and opinions about national patient-accessible EHRs through focused analyses of the national and combined data sets from the NORDeHEALTH 2022 Patient Survey.
|
|
| 10. |
- Kujala, Sari, et al.
(författare)
-
Benchmarking usability of patient portals in Estonia, Finland, Norway, and Sweden
- 2024
-
Ingår i: International Journal of Medical Informatics. - : Elsevier. - 1386-5056 .- 1872-8243. ; 181
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- INTRODUCTION: Poor usability is a barrier to widespread adoption of electronic health records (EHR). Providing good usability is especially challenging in the health care context, as there is a wide variety of patient users. Usability benchmarking is an approach for improving usability by evaluating and comparing the strength and weaknesses of systems. The main purpose of this study is to benchmark usability of patient portals across countries. METHODS: A mixed-methods survey approach was applied to benchmark the national patient portals offering patient access to EHR in Estonia, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. These Nordic countries have similar public healthcare systems, and they are pioneers in offering patients access to EHR for several years. In a survey of 29,334 patients, both patients' quantitative ratings of usability and their qualitative descriptions of very positive and very negative peak experiences of portal use were collected. RESULTS: The usability scores ranged from good to fair level of usability. The narratives of very positive and very negative experiences included the benefits of the patient portals and experienced usability issues. The regression analysis of results showed that very positive and negative experiences of patient portal use explain 19-35% of the variation of usability scores in the four countries. The percentage of patients who reported very positive or very negative experiences in each country was unrelated to the usability scores across countries. CONCLUSIONS: The survey approach could be used to evaluate usability with a wide variety of users and it supported learning from comparison across the countries. The combination of quantitative and qualitative data provided an approximation of the level of the perceived usability, and identified usability issues to be improved and useful features that patients appreciate. Further work is needed to improve the comparability of the varied samples across countries.
|
|
