A Patient-based Hospital Referral Decision Support System

Omotosho, Adebayo; Adegbola, Omotanwa; Adebo, Adelola

doi:10.5120/ijca2016912459

Cited by 8 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…[1] These levels interact through a referral system, which supports the mobility of patients to ensure they receive adequate healthcare services from the appropriate provider. [2] The major triggers for referrals are limited resources and skills at the lower level. Henceforth, the healthcare provider decides to transfer, refers or hands over responsibilities to another provider in the same or different health setting.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perception of Healthcare Providers on the Existing Patient Referral System and Recommendations on the Development of the Electronic Referral System in Rwanda: A Mixed Method Study

Kalume

Jansen

Nyssen

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Background Referral systems support the mobility of patients to ensure they receive adequate healthcare services from the appropriate provider. The major triggers for referrals are limited resources and skills at the lower level of care. An electronic referral system has the potential to considerably improve communication between primary care providers and specialists by submitting standardized and complete electronic referral requests which contain all relevant information needed for a smooth coordination, continuity of care, and facilitating urgent cases. The main objective of this study is to investigate the perception of healthcare providers regarding the existing paper-based referrals and their suggestions on the development of the electronic referral system in order to improve the health information exchange, the coordination and the continuity of care. Methods A mixed method approach was used to examine healthcare providers' perception of the referral system. For the quantitative analysis, a questionnaire was used to collect data from July to October 2021. A purposive sampling was used to select healthcare providers and a descriptive analysis was performed using SPSS 27. For the qualitative study design two focused group discussions were conducted, data were transcribed and analyzed using NVivo R 1.6. Results Overall, 345 referral constituents, including 202 mandatory and 143 optional ones were confirmed by the healthcare providers. The qualitative findings concerned two themes. The first one elucidated the challenges with the existing paper-based referral system pointing out delays in the referral process; incompleteness of paper-based referral sheet; referral triage; premature referral; absence or incomplete counter referral; patient privacy; and language problems. The second theme suggested features to be included in the electronic referral system, the procedures to follow during the transition phase, proposed mandatory and optional constituents, predicted challenges and expected benefits. Conclusion This study gathered perceptions of healthcare providers on the existing referral system, further elucidated their expectations on the electronic referral system and proposed features to be considered in its design. Finally, leads to a proposed design of an electronic external referral form.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perception of Healthcare Providers on the Existing Patient Referral System and Recommendations on the Development of the Electronic Referral System in Rwanda: A Mixed Method Study

Kalume

Jansen

Nyssen

et al. 2023

Preprint

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“…However, this is not very effective due to the challenges faced by the referral mechanism such as poor road networks, self-referrals, lack of referral forms, limited emergency medicines, and supplies including blood for transfusion at the referral facility (MoH, Makerere University School of Public Health & Health Systems 20/20, 2012). Health facilities use various methods of referral such as a paper process referral, this is where r eferral letter is written for the patient that is presented to the next referred hospital though it has limitations such as inadequate information, lost or misplaced paper records among others (Omotosho, Adegbola & Adebo, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Challenges Affecting Health Referral Systems in Low-And Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Literature Review

Nakayuki¹,

Basaza²,

Namatovu³

2021

EJHS

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Aims: Low and middle-income countries are still facing challenges of dysfunctional referral systems which have impaired health service provision. This review aimed at investigating these challenges to understand their nature, cause, and the impacts they have on health service provision. Methods: Database search was made in Google scholar, ACM Library, PubMed health, and BMC public health, and a total of 123 papers were generated. Only 14 fitted the inclusion criteria. Inclusion criteria included studies that were both quantitative and qualitative addressing challenges facing referral systems or health referral systems, studies describing the barriers to effective referral systems, and studies describing factors that affect referral systems. The review only included studies conducted in LMICs and included literature between January 2010 and February 2021. Findings: Results revealed that human resource and financial constraints, non-compliance, and communication are the key challenges affecting referral systems in LMICs. Recommendation: Countries that are facing these challenges need to overhaul the system and improve end-to-end communication between hospitals, improve capacity specifically in referral and emergency units, and sensitizing patients on the adherence to emergency protocols.

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“…For instance, in Africa, patients' anamneses are mostly fragmented, disjointed and distributed among several healthcare givers platforms which may be public or private [12,13,14,15]. This, however, constitutes a problem that limits completeness, sharing and accessibility of information, most especially with public hospitals which are generally non-ICT compliant.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Current State of ICT in Healthcare Delivery in Developing Countries

Omotosho

Ayegba²,

Emuoyibofarhe³

et al. 2019

Int. J. Onl. Eng.

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Electronic health is one of the most popular applications of information and communication technologies and it has contributed immensely to health delivery through the provision of quality health service and ubiquitous access at a lower cost. Even though this mode of health service is increasingly becoming known or used in developing nations, these countries are faced with a myriad of challenges when implementing and deploying e-health services on both small and large scale. It is estimated that the Africa population alone carries the highest percentage of the world’s global diseases despite its certain level of e-health adoption. This paper aims at analyzing the progress so far and the current state of e-health in developing countries particularly Africa and propose a framework for further improvement.

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A Patient-based Hospital Referral Decision Support System

Cited by 8 publications

References 19 publications

Perception of Healthcare Providers on the Existing Patient Referral System and Recommendations on the Development of the Electronic Referral System in Rwanda: A Mixed Method Study

Perception of Healthcare Providers on the Existing Patient Referral System and Recommendations on the Development of the Electronic Referral System in Rwanda: A Mixed Method Study

Challenges Affecting Health Referral Systems in Low-And Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Literature Review

Current State of ICT in Healthcare Delivery in Developing Countries

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