Information needs of clinicians and non‐clinicians in the Emergency Department: a qualitative study

The results suggest there are significant gaps in the preparedness and ability of LPNs to access and apply research evidence effectively in the workplace. There are several areas in which the training provided by Librarians appears either misaligned or ineffective.

The use of social network service (SNS) applications for health communication has revolutionized communication between physicians in recent years. We performed an unrestricted retrospective study focusing on emergency physicians (EPs) in Kyoto University Hospital (KUHP) since timely communication is important during emergencies. EPs used LINE, a popular SNS application in Japan. EPs (n = 22) sent 1752 messages from April 2017 to March 2018. Most messages sent contained text data (82.1%), the remaining contained media (17.9%); media included images (72.6%), LINE stamps (22.9%), LINE albums (2.3%) and les (1.6%). Content analysis by two coders produced 13 categories (n = 1438); these were miscellaneous , patient , team , treatment , event , situation , reference , announcement , schedule , resource , policy , transport and unknown. The top ve message categories were related to miscellaneous chat (22.5%), patient (19.1%), team (14.3%), treatment (11.8%) and event (6.6%). The largest number of messages among EPs were sent on Monday and Friday. The numbers of messages sent among EPs during day-shift and night-shift were similar. The categories identi ed in uenced our proposal of medical oriented SNS platform features: structured tagging system for messages related to relevant categories (F1); inquiry broadcast system for speci c inquiries using structured tagging (F2); image tagging system for images shared within groups (F3) and summarized noti cations (F4). Features that need consideration are (1) an opt-in location sharing system between physicians and (2) physicians access to patient records from the SNS application. In this study, messages discussed by EPs were categorized and the resulting categories in uenced our proposal of a physician-centered SNS platform customized to EPs roles. Since physicians prefer using SNS applications compared to traditional mobile phones, their information needs should be considered. Designing a medical oriented SNS platform that is physician-centered should rst include an understanding of topics discussed by physicians. Based on the categories classi ed, the proposal of physician-centered features for designing a medical oriented SNS platform is also discussed in this paper.

This research examined the information behavior of parents (including legal guardians) during an emergent health situation with a child. Although many studies examine health-related information behaviors, very few explore health consumers' information practices during moments of health crisis. This study explored parents' information needs, source use, and source preferences during a visit to the emergency department. An online questionnaire was administered using iPads given to 897 parents with children at one of 32 participating general emergency departments (ED) across Canada. Before taking their child to the ED, only 38.8% (n=348) of parents looked for information; those who did search looked most frequently for information about specific symptoms or severity of illness. Prior to visiting the ED the sources most frequently accessed were the internet and direct contact with healthcare professionals. At the emergency department, parents' information needs centred on immediate concerns, including explanations of their child's illness, treatments, and care instructions. Household income, education level, and parents' age were factors that affected information seeking in emergent health situations. Overwhelmingly, speaking to a healthcare professional in person is the typical and preferred way to obtain health information when facing a health crisis involving a child. The results have implications for how and when healthcare information is shared; the findings add to the limited research on parents' information behavior, particularly their roles as information proxies for their children.