Portals should provide a single integrated experience across the inpatient and ambulatory settings. Core functionality includes tools that facilitate communication, personalize the patient, and deliver education to advance safe, coordinated, and dignified patient-centered care. Our findings can be used to inform a "road map" for future work related to acute care patient portals.

A study was conducted to explore the effects of Parkinson's disease on people's social interactions. An exploratory qualitative design was used. Participants were a purposive sample of 10 people with Parkinson's disease who were attending a hospital outpatients' neurology clinic. Data were collected by semi-structured in-depth interviews. All interviews were transcribed and analysed by using conventional content analysis to explore the participants' experiences and perceptions on social interactions, using the central question 'what effect does Parkinson's disease have on people's social interactions?' Analysis revealed that Parkinson's disease affected social interactions by disrupting social connectedness. Social connectedness was disrupted by a number of factors, including 'progressive physical disability, mood disturbances, shrinking of social activities and secluding oneself. Older adults with Parkinson's disease therefore face a number of challenges to remaining socially connected. It appears that disrupted social connectedness is one of the negative consequences of living with Parkinson's.

BACKGROUND Planning for discharge from the hospital should begin early in each patient's stay and focus on the patient's needs. OBJECTIVE To determine how often patient‐reported barriers to discharge on admission were resolved by discharge and to explore associations between barriers and readmission. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS A prospective observational study of patients admitted to an academic medical center. INTERVENTION AND MEASUREMENTS Patients completed a barriers to discharge survey from the start of hospitalization to discharge. Primary outcomes were the prevalence of discharge barriers, rates of resolution of barriers during hospitalization, and comparisons between barriers identified in admission and discharge surveys. RESULTS One hundred sixty‐three patients were enrolled, and 68 patients (42%) completed an admission survey and discharge survey ≤48 hours before discharge. Patients completed on average 1.82 surveys (standard deviation, 1.10; range, 1–8). Total and mean numbers of barriers were highest on the admission survey and decreased until the fourth survey. On average, the total number of barriers to discharge decreased by 0.15 (95% confidence interval: 0.01‐0.30) per day (P = 0.047). Ninety percent of patients were discharged with at least 1 issue. The 3 most common barriers on the admission and discharge survey remained the same: pain, lack of understanding of recovery plan, and daily‐living activities. CONCLUSIONS Patient‐reported barriers to discharge are prevalent and incompletely addressed. This suggests an opportunity for improved discharge planning and a framework for communication between providers and patients. Journal of Hospital Medicine 2016;11:610–614. © 2016 Society of Hospital Medicine

The study results showed that older adults with PD face a number of challenges in self-care. In addition, the 'fear of becoming disabled' was the main concern of patients with PD, particularly in late stages of the disease.

As part of an interdisciplinary acute care patient portal task force with members from 10 academic medical centers and professional organizations, we held a national workshop with 71 attendees representing over 30 health systems, professional organizations, and technology companies. Our consensus approach identified 7 key sociotechnical and evaluation research focus areas related to the consumption and capture of information from patients, care partners (eg, family, friends), and clinicians through portals in the acute and post-acute care settings. The 7 research areas were: (1) standards, (2) privacy and security, (3) user-centered design, (4) implementation, (5) data and content, (6) clinical decision support, and (7) measurement. Patient portals are not yet in routine use in the acute and post-acute setting, and research focused on the identified domains should increase the likelihood that they will deliver benefit, especially as there are differences between needs in acute and post-acute care compared to the ambulatory setting.