The researchers divided eHealth technologies into three categories:
- storing, managing, and transmitting data (such as electronic health records and picture archiving communications);
- clinical decision support (such as physician order entry and e-prescribing); and
- providing care from a distance (such as telehealth).
They viewed more than 46,000 references -- published between 1997 and 2010 -- from which they identified 108 reviews.
Overall, the evidence in support of these eHealth technologies was "weak and inconsistent"--with insubstantial evidence to support the cost-effectiveness of these technologies, the researchers said. For example, they said they limited evidence that only a few of the presumed benefits could be realized.
At other times, they said that they found some evidence that introducing these new eHealth technologies may, on occasion, generate new risks--such as prescribers becoming over-reliant on clinical decision support for e-prescribing, or overestimating its functionality--resulting in decreased provider performance.
To bridge this information gap, future eHealth technologies need to be evaluated against a comprehensive set of measures--ideally throughout all stages of the technology's life cycle. These evaluations should incorporate socio-technical factors to "maximize the likelihood of successful implementation and adoption," they said.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Janice Simmons
Quelle/Source: FierceHealthIT, 24.01.2011
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