Cooperative Epistemic Work in Medical Practice: An Analysis of Physicians’ Clinical Notes

Expanding the ethnographic toolkit: Using medical documents to include kinless older adults living with dementia in qualitative research

Ethnographic research with cognitively impaired older adults can be challenging, in part because cognitive impairment raises questions about the ability to provide informed consent. Relying on proxy consent is a commonly used strategy, but often excludes people with dementia who lack close kin (de Medeiros, Girling, & Berlinger, 2022). In this paper, we describe how we have analyzed existing research data from a well-established and ongoing prospective cohort study, the Adult Changes in Thought Study, along with unstructured text from the medical records of participants who had no living spouse or adult children when they developed dementia, as a way of studying the circumstances, life trajectories, caregiving resources, and care needs of this vulnerable and difficult-to-research group. In this article, we detail this methodology, exploring what can and cannot be gleaned from it, what the ethical implications may be, and how and whether this type of research can be considered ethnographic. In conclusion, we argue that collaborative interdisciplinary research using existing, longitudinal research data and text from medical records deserves to be considered as a potentially useful addition to the ethnographic toolkit. We anticipate that this is a methodology that could be applied more broadly, and paired with more traditional ethnographic methods, might be one way to make research with this population more inclusive.

Challenges in user-driven optimization of EHR: A case study of a large Epic implementation in Denmark

BACKGROUND

Research suggests that capturing the benefits of electronic health records (EHR) requires systematic and ongoing optimization of technology configuration and use after implementation. However, little is known about EHR optimization in a hospital context.

OBJECTIVE

To explore the issues and challenges involved in organizing and managing a systematic user-driven EHR optimization program.

METHODS

A longitudinal case study of an EHR optimization program launched in two large Danish hospital systems was undertaken. It involved interviewing 28 key managers, clinicians and IT staff, participating in formal and informal meetings, and reviewing policy documents, meeting minutes, teaching materials and other relevant documents.

FINDINGS

The two hospital systems are struggling to find the best way to organize and manage the optimization program. So far, the program has been a mixed success. Involving clinicians in EHR optimization poses serious dilemmas for hospital managers, who must manage two related tensions: between standardization and adaptation, and between centralized control and local autonomy.

CONCLUSION

The findings highlight the significant challenges in designing a successful EHR optimization program and underscore the importance of developing more sophisticated strategies for clinical standardization and innovation.

Qualitative and quantitative approach to assess of the potential for automating administrative tasks in general practice

OBJECTIVE

To identify the extent to which administrative tasks carried out by primary care staff in general practice could be automated.

DESIGN

A mixed-method design including ethnographic case studies, focus groups, interviews and an online survey of automation experts.

SETTING

Three urban and three rural general practice health centres in England selected for differences in list size and organisational characteristics.

PARTICIPANTS

Observation and interviews with 65 primary care staff in the following job roles: administrator, manager, general practitioner, healthcare assistant, nurse practitioner, pharmacy technician, phlebotomist, practice nurse, pharmacist, prescription clerk, receptionist, scanning clerk, secretary and medical summariser; together with a survey of 156 experts in automation technologies.

METHODS

330 hours of ethnographic observation and documentation of administrative tasks carried out by staff in each of the above job roles, followed by coding and classification; semistructured interviews with 10 general practitioners and 6 staff focus groups. The online survey of machine learning, artificial intelligence and robotics experts was analysed using an ordinal Gaussian process prediction model to estimate the automatability of the observed tasks.

RESULTS

The model predicted that roughly 44% of administrative tasks carried out by staff in general practice are 'mostly' or 'completely' automatable using currently available technology. Discussions with practice staff underlined the need for a cautious approach to implementation.

CONCLUSIONS

There is considerable potential to extend the use of automation in primary care, but this will require careful implementation and ongoing evaluation.

[Legitimate resistance without technophobia: Analysis of electronic medical records impacts on the medical profession]

The objective of this short narrative literature review is to highlight the different difficulties encountered by medical doctor in the daily use of EMR. We show that these are not simple transitional phenomena related to a "resistance to change", but rather the fact of a deeper and unfinished transformation. Beyond the "perception of misfit with work processes" or the threat of a loss of autonomy, we propose to analyze this so-called "resistance" in relation to the formalization of medical work induced by EMR. Our question concerns the compatibility of the multiple objectives of EMR, the potential influence of computerization on the steps of entering and consulting medical information, the impact on the clinical reasoning, the reality of assistance to medical "performance". The question is not so much what EMRs do less well than the paper record, but to provide insights into how tomorrow's EMRs will do better than today's.

Clinicians' reasoning as reflected in electronic clinical note-entry and reading/retrieval: a systematic review and qualitative synthesis

Objective

To describe the literature exploring the use of electronic health record (EHR) systems to support creation and use of clinical documentation to guide future research.

Materials and Methods

We searched databases including MEDLINE, Scopus, and CINAHL from inception to April 20, 2018, for studies applying qualitative or mixed-methods examining EHR use to support creation and use of clinical documentation. A qualitative synthesis of included studies was undertaken.

Results

Twenty-three studies met the inclusion criteria and were reviewed in detail. We briefly reviewed 9 studies that did not meet the inclusion criteria but provided recommendations for EHR design. We identified 4 key themes: purposes of electronic clinical notes, clinicians' reasoning for note-entry and reading/retrieval, clinicians' strategies for note-entry, and clinicians' strategies for note-retrieval/reading. Five studies investigated note purposes and found that although patient care is the primary note purpose, non-clinical purposes have become more common. Clinicians' reasoning studies (n = 3) explored clinicians' judgement about what to document and represented clinicians' thought process in cognitive pathways. Note-entry studies (n = 6) revealed that what clinicians document is affected by EHR interfaces. Lastly, note-retrieval studies (n = 12) found that "assessment and plan" is the most read note section and what clinicians read is affected by external stimuli, care/information goals, and what they know about the patient.

Conclusion

Despite the widespread adoption of EHRs, their use to support note-entry and reading/retrieval is still understudied. Further research is needed to investigate approaches to capture and represent clinicians' reasoning and improve note-entry and retrieval/reading.