Shifting Mindsets: The Impact of a Patient Portal on Functioning and Recovery in a Mental Health Setting.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to understand whether higher use of a patient portal can have an impact on mental health functioning and recovery. METHOD: A mixed methods approach was used for this study. In 2019-2021, patients with mental health diagnoses at outpatient clinics in an academic centre were invited to complete World Health Organization Disability Assessment Scale 12 (WHODAS-12) and Mental Health Recovery Measure surveys at baseline, 3 months, and 6 months after signing up for the portal. At the 3-month time point, patients were invited to a semistructured interview with a member of the team to contextualize the findings obtained from the surveys. Analytics data was also collected from the platform to understand usage patterns on the portal. RESULTS: Overall, 113 participants were included in the analysis. There was no significant change in mental health functioning and recovery scores over the 6-month period. However, suboptimal usage was observed as 46% of participants did not complete any tasks within the portal. Thirty-five participants had low use of the portal (1-9 interactions) and 18 participants had high usage (10+ interactions). There were also no differences in mental health functioning and recovery scores between low and high users of the portal. Qualitative interviews highlighted many opportunities where the portal can support overall functioning and mental health recovery. CONCLUSIONS: Collectively, this study suggests that higher use of a portal had no impact, either positive or negative, on mental health outcomes. While it may offer convenience and improved patient satisfaction, adequate support is needed to fully enable these opportunities for patient care. As the type of interaction with the portal was not specifically addressed, future work should focus on looking at ways to support patient engagement and portal usage throughout their care journey.

Exploring the Use of Telemonitoring for Patients at High Risk for Hypertensive Disorders of Pregnancy in the Antepartum and Postpartum Periods: Scoping Review.

BACKGROUND: High blood pressure complicates 2% to 8% of pregnancies, and its complications are present in the antepartum and postpartum periods. Blood pressure during and after pregnancy is routinely monitored during clinic visits. Some guidelines recommend using home blood pressure measurements for the management and treatment of hypertension, with increased frequency of monitoring for high-risk pregnancies. Blood pressure self-monitoring may have a role in identifying those in this high-risk group. Therefore, this high-risk pregnancy group may be well suited for telemonitoring interventions. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to explore the use of telemonitoring in patients at high risk for hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (HDP) during the antepartum and postpartum periods. This paper aims to answer the following question: What is the current knowledge base related to the use of telemonitoring interventions for the management of patients at high risk for HDP? METHODS: A literature review following the methodological framework described by Arksey et al and Levac et al was conducted to analyze studies describing the telemonitoring of patients at high risk for HDP. A qualitative study, observational studies, and randomized controlled trials were included in this scoping review. RESULTS: Of the 3904 articles initially identified, 20 met the inclusion criteria. Most of the studies (13/20, 65%) were published between 2017 and 2018. In total, there were 16 unique interventions described in the 20 articles, all of which provide clinical decision support and 12 of which are also used to facilitate the self-management of HDP. Each intervention's design and process of implementation varied. Overall, telemonitoring interventions for the management of HDP were found to be feasible and convenient, and they were used to facilitate access to health services. Two unique studies reported significant findings for the telemonitoring group, namely, spontaneous deliveries were more likely, and one study, reported in two papers, described inductions as being less likely to occur compared with the control group. However, the small study sample sizes, nonrandomized groups, and short study durations limit the findings from the included articles. CONCLUSIONS: Although current evidence suggests that telemonitoring could provide benefits for managing patients at high risk for HDP, more research is needed to prove its safety and effectiveness. This review proposes four recommendations for future research: (1) the implementation of large prospective studies to establish the safety and effectiveness of telemonitoring interventions; (2) additional research to determine the context-specific requirements and patient suitability to enhance accessibility to healthcare services for remote regions and underserved populations; (3) the inclusion of privacy and security considerations for telemonitoring interventions to better comply with healthcare information regulations and guidelines; and (4) the implementation of studies to better understand the effective components of telemonitoring interventions.

Delivery of Compassionate Mental Health Care in a Digital Technology-Driven Age: Scoping Review.

BACKGROUND: Compassion is a vital component to the achievement of positive health outcomes, particularly in mental health care. The rise of digital technologies may influence the delivery of compassionate care, and thus this relationship between compassion and digital health care needs to be better understood. OBJECTIVE: This scoping review aimed to identify existing digital technologies being used by patients and health professionals in the delivery of mental health care, understand how digital technologies are being used in the delivery of compassionate mental health care, and determine the facilitators of and barriers to digital technology use among patients and health professionals in the delivery of compassionate mental health care. METHODS: We conducted this scoping review through a search of Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online (MEDLINE), MEDLINE In-Process and EPub Ahead of Print, PsycINFO, and Web of Science for articles published from 1990 to 2019. RESULTS: Of the 4472 articles screened, 37 articles were included for data extraction. Telemedicine was the most widely used technology by mental health professionals. Digital technologies were described as facilitating compassionate care and were classified using a conceptual model to identify each digital intersection with compassionate care. Facilitators of and barriers to providing compassionate care through digital technology were identified, including increased safety for providers, health care professional perceptions and abilities, and the use of picture-in-picture feedback to evaluate social cues. CONCLUSIONS: Implementing digital technology into mental health care can improve the current delivery of compassionate care and create novel ways to provide compassion. However, as this is a new area of study, mental health professionals and organizations alike should be mindful that compassionate human-centered care is maintained in the delivery of digital health care. Future research could develop tools to facilitate and evaluate the enactment of compassion within digital health care.

Outcomes of a Heart Failure Telemonitoring Program Implemented as the Standard of Care in an Outpatient Heart Function Clinic: Pretest-Posttest Pragmatic Study.

BACKGROUND: Telemonitoring (TM) can improve heart failure (HF) outcomes by facilitating patient self-care and clinical decisions. The Medly program enables patients to use a mobile phone to record daily HF readings and receive personalized self-care messages generated by a clinically validated algorithm. The TM system also generates alerts, which are immediately acted upon by the patients' existing care team. This program has been operating for 3 years as part of the standard of care in an outpatient heart function clinic in Toronto, Canada. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to evaluate the 6-month impact of this TM program on health service utilization, clinical outcomes, quality of life (QoL), and patient self-care. METHODS: This pragmatic quality improvement study employed a pretest-posttest design to compare 6-month outcome measures with those at program enrollment. The primary outcome was the number of HF-related hospitalizations. Secondary outcomes included all-cause hospitalizations, emergency department visits (HF related and all cause), length of stay (HF related and all cause), and visits to the outpatient clinic. Clinical outcomes included bloodwork (B-type natriuretic peptide [BNP], creatinine, and sodium), left ventricular ejection fraction, and predicted survival score using the Seattle Heart Failure Model. QoL was measured using the Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire (MLHFQ) and the 5-level EuroQol 5-dimensional questionnaire. Self-care was measured using the Self-Care of Heart Failure Index (SCHFI). The difference in outcome scores was analyzed using negative binomial distribution and Poisson regressions for the health service utilization outcomes and linear regressions for all other outcomes to control for key demographic and clinical variables. RESULTS: Available data for 315 patients enrolled in the TM program between August 2016 and January 2019 were analyzed. A 50% decrease in HF-related hospitalizations (incidence rate ratio [IRR]=0.50; P<.001) and a 24% decrease in the number of all-cause hospitalizations (IRR=0.76; P=.02) were found when comparing the number of events 6 months after program enrollment with the number of events 6 months before enrollment. With regard to clinical outcomes at 6 months, a 59% decrease in BNP values was found after adjusting for control variables. Moreover, 6-month MLHFQ total scores were 9.8 points lower than baseline scores (P<.001), representing a clinically meaningful improvement in HF-related QoL. Similarly, the MLHFQ physical and emotional subscales showed a decrease of 5.4 points (P<.001) and 1.5 points (P=.04), respectively. Finally, patient self-care after 6 months improved as demonstrated by a 7.8-point (P<.001) and 8.5-point (P=.01) increase in the SCHFI maintenance and management scores, respectively. No significant changes were observed in the remaining secondary outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: This study suggests that an HF TM program, which provides patients with self-care support and active monitoring by their existing care team, can reduce health service utilization and improve clinical, QoL, and patient self-care outcomes.

The Role of Nurse Managers in the Adoption of Health Information Technology: Findings From a Qualitative Study.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to investigate the role of nurse managers in supporting point-of-care nurses' health information technology (IT) use and identify strategies employed by nurse managers to improve adoption, while also gathering point-of-care nurses' perceptions of these strategies. BACKGROUND: Nurse managers are essential in facilitating point-of-care nurses' use of health IT; however, the underlying phenomenon for this facilitation remains unreported. METHODS: A qualitative descriptive study was conducted with 10 nurse managers and 14 point-of-care nurses recruited from a mental health hospital environment in Ontario, Canada. Inductive and deductive content analyses were used to analyze the semistructured interviews. RESULTS: Nurse managers adopt the role of advocate, educator, and connector, using the following strategies: communicating system updates, demonstrating use of health IT, linking staff to resources, facilitating education, and providing IT oversight. CONCLUSIONS: Nurse managers use a variety of strategies to support nurses' use of health IT. Future research should focus on the effectiveness of these strategies.

Delivery of compassionate mental health care in a digital technology-driven age: protocol for a scoping review.

INTRODUCTION: As digital technologies become an integral part of mental health care delivery, concerns have risen regarding how this technology may detract from health professionals' ability to provide compassionate care. To maintain and improve the quality of care for people with mental illness, there is a need to understand how to effectively incorporate technologies into the delivery of compassionate mental health care. The objectives of this scoping review are to: (1) identify the digital technologies currently being used among patients and health professionals in the delivery of mental health care; (2) determine how these digital technologies are being used in the context of the delivery of compassionate care and (3) uncover the barriers to, and facilitators of, digital technology-driven delivery of compassionate mental health care. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: Searches were conducted of five databases, consisting of relevant articles published in English between 1990 and 2019. Identified articles will be independently screened for eligibility by two reviewers, first at a title and abstract stage, and then at a full-text level. Data will be extracted and compiled from eligible articles into a data extraction chart. Information collected will include a basic overview of the publication including the article title, authors, year of publication, country of origin, research design and research question addressed. On completion of data synthesis, the authors will conduct a consultation phase with relevant experts in the field. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval is not required for this scoping review. With regards to the dissemination plan, principles identified from the relevant articles may be presented at conferences and an article will be published in an academic journal with study results. The authors also intend to engage interested mental health professionals, health professional educators and patients in a discussion about the study findings and implications for the future.