Research in Integrated Health Care and Publication Trends from the Perspective of Global Informatics

Perceived knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding the medical consortium among medical staff in Sichuan, China: a cross-sectional survey

BACKGROUND

In China, fragmented and inefficient health care systems are common while quality resources are limited. To promote an organized, efficient system, the government launched a medical consortium policy to vertically integrate health care through the collaboration of different levels of medical care. Logically, medical staff's knowledge, attitudes and practices (KAP) regarding the consortium are critical for its development. The objective of this study was to explore the KAP regarding the medical consortium among medical staff in a medical consortium in Sichuan Province, China.

METHODS

A cross-sectional survey was conducted. In total, 690 medical staff members in 3 cities of Sichuan Province, China, were interviewed from November 2018 to December 2018. The questionnaire consisted of 18 items, including 4 items related to perceived knowledge, 4 items related to attitudes and 2 items related to practices, and was rated on a 5-point Likert scale (one = strongly disagree/do not know, five = strongly agree/know).

RESULTS

The effective response sample was 640 copies of the questionnaire, and most medical staff members (92.50%) knew about the cooperation with other hospitals in the medical consortium. Medical staff scored differently on each item in the questionnaire, with the highest score being the item 'agreeing with the ward rounds and clinical teaching and training organized by the leading hospital' (4.54 ± 0.76), and the lowest score being the item 'frequency in participating in ward rounds and clinical teaching organized by the leading hospital' (2.83 ± 1.36). In addition, the effect of demographic characteristics on KAP was evaluated by stepwise multiple regression analysis, and a significant positive correlation was found between all the studied variables by Spearman's correlation (p < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

This study showed that the attitudes toward and knowledge of the medical consortium significantly contribute to practices, satisfaction with the support work performed by the leading hospital and agreement of improvement after joining the medical consortium. Thus, to improve medical staff's KAP and satisfaction, publicity and educational programs in medical consortia are necessary, and the leading hospital should attach importance to the informatization construction and demand of different medical staff members.

CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION

There are no clinical trials in this study.

Bibliometric Literature Analysis of a Multi-Dimensional Sustainable Development Issue: Energy Poverty

Energy plays a critical role in building a sustainable future—economically, socially, and environmentally. Energy poverty holds a similarly prominent position and covers certain economic, social and environmental issues that are underlined by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. Due to its multidimensional role in plans for achieving sustainable development, there is a growing body of literature focusing on various aspects of energy poverty. This study conducts a bibliometric analysis of this literature by utilizing more extensive data from the Web of Science, covering all information on energy poverty studies. The analysis reveals how energy poverty has attracted attention over time, who the leading authors are, which studies constitute outstanding contributions to the literature, which different sides of the research topic stand out, and also highlights the potential research gaps. The results reveal all the network flows among researchers, publications, journals, keywords, organizations, co-cited publications, and bibliographic coupling for energy poverty studies. The findings confirm the increasing popularity of energy poverty as a topic and demonstrate the increasing awareness of the issue in academia over time.