BACKGROUND: The Internet is becoming increasingly important as a way for patients to acquire medical information and as a means for patient-physician communication. Questions about appropriate use of this new technology have been brought to the fore by the many patients using the Internet to seek sildenafil prescriptions. OBJECTIVE: To present the first description of a physician designed and directed Internet-based prescribing system of sildenafil, together with data covering more than...

BACKGROUND: The Wireless Application Protocol technology implemented in newer mobile phones has built-in facilities for handling much of the information processing needed in clinical work. OBJECTIVES: To test a practical approach we ported a relational database of the Danish pharmaceutical catalogue to Wireless Application Protocol using open source freeware at all steps. METHODS: We used Apache 1.3 web software on a Linux server. Data containing the Danish pharmaceutical catalogue were...

BACKGROUND: In 1998, the U.K. National Health Service Information for Health Strategy proposed the implementation of a National electronic Library for Health to provide clinicians, healthcare managers and planners, patients and the public with easy, round the clock access to high quality, up-to-date electronic information on health and healthcare. The Virtual Branch Libraries are among the most important components of the National electronic Library for Health . They aim at creating online...

BACKGROUND: The sharing of information resources is generally accepted as the key to substantial improvements in productivity and better quality of care. In addition, due to the greater mobility of the population, national and international healthcare networks are increasingly used to facilitate the sharing of healthcare-related information among the various actors of the field. In the context of HYGEIAnet, the regional health telematics network of Crete, an Integrated Electronic Health...

BACKGROUND: The ease by which the Internet is able to distribute information to geographically-distant users on a wide variety of computers makes it an obvious candidate for a technological solution for electronic patient record systems. Indeed, second-generation Internet technologies such as the ones described in this article - XML (eXtensible Markup Language), XSL (eXtensible Style Language), DOM (Document Object Model), CSS (Cascading Style Sheet), JavaScript, and JavaBeans - may...

BACKGROUND: Clinical information systems frequently use intranet and Internet technologies. However these technologies have emphasized sharing and not security, despite the sensitive and private nature of much health information. Digital certificates (electronic documents which recognize an entity or its attributes) can be used to control access in clinical intranet applications. OBJECTIVES: To outline the need for access control in distributed clinical database systems, to describe the use...

BACKGROUND: The Intranet is a rapidly evolving technology in large hospitals. In this paper, we describe the first phase of an Intranet project in a multi-hospital system in New York City. OBJECTIVES: (1) To encourage the use of the Intranet among physicians, nurses, managers, and other associates in a multi-hospital system; and (2) to build the Intranet in a cost-effective manner using existing resources. METHODS: A WebTrends Log Analyzer assessed the Intranet use in terms of the number of...

BACKGROUND: Strict work timetables, personal and professional duties or an inability to be absent from home or work can all represent major constraints for those wishing to improve their professional skills. Within this context, the World Wide Web can allow people to conveniently follow distance courses from their homes. OBJECTIVE: To present an experience in the use of the Web in the continuing education of healthcare professionals in Brazil. METHODS: A Web-based distance education course...

BACKGROUND: The Internet provides many advantages when used for interaction and data sharing among health care providers, patients, and researchers. However, the advantages provided by the Internet come with a significantly greater element of risk to the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information. It is therefore essential that Health Care Establishments processing and exchanging medical data use an appropriate security policy. OBJECTIVE: To develop a High Level Security...

BACKGROUND: Digital health information is available on a wide variety of platforms including PC-access of the Internet, Wireless Application Protocol phones, CD-ROMs, and touch screen public kiosks. All these platforms record details of user sessions in transaction log files, and there is a growing body of research into the evaluation of this data. However, there is very little research that has examined the problems of comparing the transaction log files of kiosks and the Internet....

BACKGROUND: Three-dimensional ultrasound images allow virtual sonography even at a distance. However, the size of final 3-D files limits their transmission through slow networks such as the Internet. OBJECTIVE: To analyze compression techniques that transform ultrasound images into small 3-D volumes that can be transmitted through the Internet without loss of relevant medical information. METHODS: Samples were selected from ultrasound examinations performed during, 1999-2000, in the...

BACKGROUND: The World Wide Web has become a widely utilized source of health information. Although the frequency of health related queries is impressive, the demographics associated with patients making queries has not been clearly delineated. OBJECTIVE: This study's objective was to determine health related Internet usage patterns of family medicine patients. METHODS: Internet use among 824 eligible patients 18 years or older attending seven university based family practice clinics during...

BACKGROUND: Digital information technology can facilitate informed decision making by individuals regarding their personal health care. The digital divide separates those who do and those who do not have access to or otherwise make use of digital information. To close the digital divide, health care communications research must address a fundamental issue, the consumer vocabulary problem: consumers of health care, at least those who are laypersons, are not always familiar with the...

BACKGROUND: Little is known about to what extent patients who underwent medical treatment access the Internet and whether they benefit from consulting the Internet. OBJECTIVE: To understand if cardiopathic patients use the Internet for health-related information and whether they find retrieved information understandable and useful. METHODS: Telephone interviews, using a semi-structured questionnaire, were conducted with 82 patients who had undergone off-pump coronary-artery bypass grafting...

BACKGROUND: It is becoming increasingly important for health professionals to have an understanding of health informatics. Education in this area must support not only undergraduate students but also the many workers who graduated before informatics education was available in the undergraduate program. To be successful, such a program must allow currently-employed students with significant work and family commitments to enroll. OBJECTIVES: The aim was to successfully create and teach a...

BACKGROUND: Hospital homepages should provide comprehensive information on the hospital's services, such as departments and treatments available, prices, waiting time, leisure facilities, and other information important for patients and their relatives. Norway, with its population of approximately 4.3 million, ranks among the top countries globally for its ability to absorb and use technology. It is unclear to what degree Norwegian hospitals and patients use the Internet for information about...

BACKGROUND: The Internet offers consumers unparalleled opportunities to acquire health information. The emergence of the Internet, rather than more-traditional sources, for obtaining health information is worthy of ongoing surveillance, including identification of the factors associated with using the Internet for this purpose. OBJECTIVES: To measure the prevalence of Internet use as a mechanism for obtaining health information in the United States; to compare such Internet use with...

BACKGROUND: Beta-thalassaemia is a hereditary disease, the prevalence of which is high in persons of Mediterranean, African, and Southeast Asian ancestry. In Greece it constitutes an important public health problem. Beta-thalassaemia necessitates continuous and complicated health care procedures such as daily chelation; biweekly transfusions; and periodic cardiology, endocrinology, and hepatology evaluations. Typically, different care items are offered in different, often-distant, health care...

BACKGROUND: The MEDICOM (Medical Products Electronic Commerce) Portal provides the electronic means for medical-equipment manufacturers to communicate online with their customers while supporting the Purchasing Process and Post Market Surveillance. The Portal offers a powerful Internet-based search tool for finding medical products and manufacturers. Its main advantage is the fast, reliable and up-to-date retrieval of information while eliminating all unrelated content that a general-purpose...

BACKGROUND: The massive growth of health information on the Internet; the global nature of the Internet; the seismic shift taking place in the relationships of various actors in this arena, and the absence of real protection from harm for citizens who use the Internet for health purposes are seen to be real problems. One response to many of these problems has been the burgeoning output of codes of conduct by numerous organizations trying to address quality of health information. OBJECTIVES:...