Occupational health physicians as users of electronic health records.

BACKGROUND: Electronic health records (EHRs)' purpose is to facilitate the documentation of patient data and to improve the exchange of information between the professionals involved in a patient's care. AIMS: To investigate occupational health (OH) physicians' experiences of EHRs and the factors hampering work. METHODS: An electronic questionnaire was sent to physicians working in OH services in April 2017 and a total of 342 OH physicians participated in the study. The results were reported as quantities and percentages. The survey text was analysed using data-driven content analysis. RESULTS: The respondents considered their EHR stable in terms of technical features but the routine tasks with EHR were not straightforward. Also, the documentation of patient data for statistical purposes took an unreasonable amount of time and the access to patient data from other organizations was poor. Instead, a well-functioning feature of EHRs were electronic prescriptions. The factors, which hampered respondents' work, were constant or frequent time pressure, too little time to do their job properly and a stress caused by uncompleted tasks. CONCLUSIONS: This study showed that the usability problems of EHRs were the slowness, unexpected downtimes and difficulties in obtaining patient data. Also, respondents felt very often a lack of time in their work. OH physicians' work is best supported by EHRs that consider their specific role in healthcare, i.e. the assessment of work ability, the co-ordination of care and rehabilitation and support for return to work.

Documentation of work ability data in occupational health records.

BACKGROUND: In Finland, patient health records are structured in the same way. Patient data entries are grouped using national headings and each data entry must have at least one heading. AIMS: To determine the use of national headings for the documentation of work ability data and to gather the experience of professionals on usefulness, ease of use and usability of national headings in occupational health services (OHSs). METHODS: An electronic questionnaire and a semi-structured themed interview were used to collect data. Data were analysed using SPSS Statistics 24 and interview material was analysed by deductive content analysis using ATLAS.ti. RESULTS: A total of 359 people completed the questionnaire. Most of the work ability data were documented using the headings history, plan and current status. More than half of respondents felt that using national headings improved quality and allowed greater control. Almost all respondents thought that learning to use national headings was easy. During the interviews (n = 19), all respondents felt that use of national headings improved the quality of documentation. However, more than half stated that national headings were not well suited to documentation of work ability data. CONCLUSION: These results can be used to develop national documentation standards, as well as electronic health records, to support healthcare professionals' interactions with working-age patients. Earlier studies of national headings in OHSs were not found.