Development and validation of an instrument for measuring competencies on public health informatics of primary health care worker (PHIC4PHC) in Indonesia

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Because of the increasing adoption and use of technology in primary health care (PHC), public health informatics competencies (PHIC) are becoming essential for public health workers. Unfortunately, no studies have measured PHIC in resource-limited setting. This paper describes the process of developing and validating Public Health Informatics Competencies for Primary Health Care (PHIC4PHC), an instrument for measuring PHC workers’ competencies in public health informatics. Method: This study developed a questionnaire that had three stages: the Delphi technique, a pretest, and field test. Eleven academicians from a university and 13 PHC workers joined 2 rounds of group discussion in the first stage. The second stage comprised two pilot studies with 75 PHC workers in Semarang Municipality. The third stage involved validating the questionnaire with 462 PHC workers in Kendal District. This study used Pearson’s product-moment correlation for the validity check and Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for determining the internal consistency. This study used the K-means algorithm for clustering the results of the PHIC4PHC questionnaire. Results and Conclusion: PHIC4PHC is the first comprehensive PHIC questionnaire administered in a resource-limited setting, consisting of 11 indicators and 42 measurement items concerning knowledge of health information systems, skills required for health data management, ethical aspects of data sharing and health information literacy. The final results of PHIC4PHC were clustered into three classes based on the K-means algorithm. Overall, 45.7% PHC workers achieved medium competency, whereas 25.6% and 27.7% achieved low and high competency, respectively. Men had higher competency than women. The higher the worker’s level of education, the higher the PHIC level; the longer the worker’s work experience, the lower the PHIC score; and the greater the worker’s age, the lower the PHIC score. Measuring and monitoring PHIC is vital to support successful health IT adoption in PHC.</jats:p>

Primary healthcare nurses' perceptions about their ability to utilise electronic health records

“…Some nurses were unsure of their ability to create multimedia files, use statistical software to analyse study data, troubleshoot typical computer errors, and assemble a computer. This supports the findings of a Delphi survey in which nurses from Indonesia reported that these skills were irrelevant to their daily work activities (Rachmani et al, 2020). The study identified no significant association between age and skills in EHR use and between years of work experience and EHR use.…”

Measuring the Digital Competence of Health Professionals: Scoping Review

“…The definitions used are either the results of scoping reviews or frameworks where many individual results have been merged (15/46, 33%) [4,10,23,26,28,33,37,42,44,46,48,51,52,59,61]. Alternatively, they are based on other, explicitly named works, such as DigComp 2.2 [7] (4/46, 9%) [22,29,54,56]; the European framework for the digital competence of educators [63] (1/46, 2%) [27]; the technology acceptance model [64] and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology [65] (1/46, 2%) [11]; the accreditation of competence in information and communication technologies by the government of Catalonia [66] (1/46, 2%) [53]; the Educause Center for Analysis and Research [67] (1/46, 2%) [60]; the General Confidence with Computer Use Scale [68] (1/46, 2%) [32]; the eHealth literacy questionnaire [69] (1/46, 2%) [40]; the eHealth literacy assessment toolkit [70] (1/46, 2%) [34]; the Self-Assessment of Nursing Informatics Competencies Scale [71] (1/46, 2%) [24]; a scale assessing the informatics competencies for nurses [72] (1/46, 2%) [39]; a scale assessing digital literacy with regard to information and communication technology [73] (1/46, 2%)…”

“…Multiple subcompetences of technical competences were identified: the ones mentioned most often were basic computer competence, meaning knowledge of different computer components and basic computer concepts [21,32,43]; and skills in using hardware (eg, switching equipment on and off and operating input and output devices) [49,62]. Internet use, consisting of navigating the internet, knowledge of various internet sources, and finding and downloading articles, is part of basic computer competence [24,25,28,37,43,52,62]. The users should be able to use and install software [24,28,32,33,37,49,52,62] and especially be able to use information and communication technology, including understanding the basic concepts and components of information and communication technology and designing, creating, integrating, publishing, and revising content [4,9,22,23,27,[35][36][37][38]41,[43][44][45][47][48][49]53,54,56,57,62].…”

“…Internet use, consisting of navigating the internet, knowledge of various internet sources, and finding and downloading articles, is part of basic computer competence [24,25,28,37,43,52,62]. The users should be able to use and install software [24,28,32,33,37,49,52,62] and especially be able to use information and communication technology, including understanding the basic concepts and components of information and communication technology and designing, creating, integrating, publishing, and revising content [4,9,22,23,27,[35][36][37][38]41,[43][44][45][47][48][49]53,54,56,57,62]. Another part of basic computer competence is file management and comprehensive knowledge of file formats, the creation of documents and folder structure [37,49], and IT security (eg, using passwords and antivirus tools) [22,29,37,38,45,52,54...…”

“…Here, one of the largest areas is the use of health applications, meaning the use of various digital health solutions for treatment planning, diagnostics, treatment, processing imaging data, and so on [22,24,33,35,40,42,48,57,58]. This includes the management of electronic patient records [22,24,37,43,49,51,57,58,62], the use of wearables and mobile health apps [30,57], the administration of electronic documentation [4,37], and the use of health information systems [37,52,55,57]. In addition, health professionals need skills and knowledge about specific data protection and security requirements of their profession [4,30,48,53].…”