Evaluating barriers to adopting telemedicine worldwide: A systematic review

Introduction and objective Studies on telemedicine have shown success in reducing the geographical and time obstacles incurred in the receipt of care in traditional modalities with the same or greater effectiveness; however, there are several barriers that need to be addressed in order for telemedicine technology to spread. The aim of this review is to evaluate barriers to adopting telemedicine worldwide through the analysis of published work. Methods The authors conducted a systematic literature review by extracting the data from the Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) and PubMed (MEDLINE) research databases. The reviewers in this study analysed 30 articles (nine from CINAHL and 21 from Medline) and identified barriers found in the literature. This review followed the checklist from Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) 2009. The reviewers organized the results into one table and five figures that depict the data in different ways, organized by: barrier, country-specific barriers, organization-specific barriers, patient-specific barriers, and medical-staff and programmer-specific barriers. Results The reviewers identified 33 barriers with a frequency of 100 occurrences through the 30 articles. The study identified the issues with technically challenged staff (11%), followed by resistance to change (8%), cost (8%), reimbursement (5%), age of patient (5%), and level of education of patient (5%). All other barriers occurred at or less than 4% of the time. Discussion and conclusions Telemedicine is not yet ubiquitous, and barriers vary widely. The top barriers are technology-specific and could be overcome through training, change-management techniques, and alternating delivery by telemedicine and personal patient-to-provider interaction. The results of this study identify several barriers that could be eliminated by focused policy. Future work should evaluate policy to identify which one to lever to maximize the results.

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Instrumented Analysis of the Sit-to-Stand Movement for Geriatric Screening: A Systematic Review

Bioengineering ◽

10.3390/bioengineering7040139 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 7 (4) ◽

pp. 139

Author(s):

Brajesh Shukla ◽

Jennifer Bassement ◽

Vivek Vijay ◽

Sandeep Yadav ◽

David Hewson

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

At Risk ◽

Older People ◽

Search Strategy ◽

Risk Of Falling ◽

Sit To Stand ◽

Risk Of Falls ◽

Geriatric Screening ◽

Meta Analyses ◽

Future Work

The Sit-to-Stand (STS) is a widely used test of physical function to screen older people at risk of falls and frailty and is also one of the most important components of standard screening for sarcopenia. There have been many recent studies in which instrumented versions of the STS (iSTS) have been developed to provide additional parameters that could improve the accuracy of the STS test. This systematic review aimed to identify whether an iSTS is a viable alternative to a standard STS to identify older people at risk of falling, frailty, and sarcopenia. A total of 856 articles were found using the search strategy developed, with 12 articles retained in the review after screening based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. Six studies evaluated the iSTS in fallers, five studies in frailty and only one study in both fallers and frailty. The results showed that power and velocity parameters extracted from an iSTS have the potential to improve the accuracy of screening when compared to a standard STS. Future work should focus on standardizing the segmentation of the STS into phases to enable comparison between studies and to develop devices integrated into the chair used for the test to improve usability.

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Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) Evaluation Methods: Protocol for a Systematic Review (Preprint)

10.2196/preprints.12087 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Kimberley Foley ◽

Abrar Alturkistani ◽

Alison Carter ◽

Terese Stenfors ◽

Elizabeth Blum ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

Online Courses ◽

Data Extraction ◽

Evaluation Methods ◽

Massive Open Online Courses ◽

Completion Rates ◽

Massive Open Online ◽

Data Synthesis ◽

Meta Analyses ◽

Future Work

BACKGROUND Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have increased in popularity in recent years. They target a wide variety of learners and use novel teaching approaches, yet often exhibit low completion rates (10%). It is important to evaluate MOOCs to determine their impact and effectiveness, but little is known at this point about the methodologies that should be used for evaluation. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this paper is to provide a protocol for a systematic review on MOOC evaluation methods. METHODS We will use the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Protocols (PRISMA-P) guidelines for reporting this protocol. We developed a population, intervention, comparator, and outcome (PICO) framework to guide the search strategy, based on the overarching question, “What methods have been used to evaluate MOOCs?” The review will follow six stages: 1) literature search, 2) article selection, 3) data extraction, 4) quality appraisal, 5) data analysis, and 6) data synthesis. RESULTS The systematic review is ongoing. We completed the data searches and data abstraction in October and November 2018. We are now analyzing the data and expect to complete the systematic review by March 2019. CONCLUSIONS This systematic review will provide a useful summary of the methods used for evaluation of MOOCs and the strengths and limitations of each approach. It will also identify gaps in the literature and areas for future work. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPOR DERR1-10.2196/12087

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Age at Menarche, Level of Education, Parity and the Risk of Hysterectomy: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analyses of Population-Based Observational Studies

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0151398 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 11 (3) ◽

pp. e0151398 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Louise F. Wilson ◽

Gita D. Mishra

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

Observational Studies ◽

Population Based ◽

Age At Menarche ◽

Level Of Education ◽

Meta Analyses

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Analysis of out-of-pocket health expenditure using the WHO Global Health Expenditure Database (GHED): A systematic review

Gaceta Médica de Caracas - Supplement 1 ◽

10.47307/gmc.2020.128.4.4 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 128 (4) ◽

pp. 474-479

Author(s):

Marino J González R

Keyword(s):

Systematic Review ◽

Global Health ◽

Health Expenditure ◽

Health Financing ◽

World Health ◽

Health Coverage ◽

Sources Of Information ◽

Health Organization ◽

Meta Analyses ◽

Country Specific

Introduction: Tracking out-of-pocket (OOP) health expenditure is a very useful reference for knowing the progress of countries in the goal of universal health coverage (UHC) in 2030. The World Health Organization (WHO) has developed the Global Health Expenditure Database (GHED) to facilitate analysis of health financing in countries or regions. The paper explores the use of GHED in the analysis of OOP health expenditure in the specialized literature. Objective: To perform a systematic review of the studies in which GHED is used to analyze OOP health expenditure in countries or groups of countries. Methods: The systematic review followed the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-analyses (PRISMA). The database used was PubMed. All publications that were available on PubMed by July 30, 2020, were identified. Results: Twenty-five papers were identified. The use of the GHED to analyze OOP health expenditure was reported in five studies, one country study, and four studies with regional comparisons. The included studies cover the period 1995-2016. Discussion: The use of the GHED for the analysis of the evolution of OOP health expenditure in countries or regions is not very widespread in the specialized literature. The GHED has proven to be a very useful instrument for international comparison, although the fact that there are differences with national reports (public expenditure reviews) makes it advisable to combine both sources of information in the analysis of country- specific health policies. Conclusion: The systematic use of the GHED can be useful to improve the quality of information and estimates, such as country-specific expenditure analyses. To this end, it is particularly important to characterize the levels of OOP health expenditure and to incorporate policy monitoring into the analyses.

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Psychological and Cognitive Aspects of Borderline Intellectual Functioning

European Psychologist ◽

10.1027/1016-9040/a000293 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 22 (3) ◽

pp. 159-166 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Bastianina Contena ◽

Stefano Taddei

Keyword(s):

Quality Of Life ◽

Systematic Review ◽

Intellectual Functioning ◽

Clinical Impact ◽

Review Of The Literature ◽

Borderline Intellectual Functioning ◽

General Quality ◽

Meta Analyses ◽

Over Time

Abstract. Borderline Intellectual Functioning (BIF) refers to a global IQ ranging from 71 to 84, and it represents a condition of clinical attention for its association with other disorders and its influence on the outcomes of treatments and, in general, quality of life and adaptation. Furthermore, its definition has changed over time causing a relevant clinical impact. For this reason, a systematic review of the literature on this topic can promote an understanding of what has been studied, and can differentiate what is currently attributable to BIF from that which cannot be associated with this kind of intellectual functioning. Using Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) criteria, we have conducted a review of the literature about BIF. The results suggest that this condition is still associated with mental retardation, and only a few studies have focused specifically on this condition.

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