http://files.sld.cu/scap/files/2013/09/histpathinf2013.pdf

The history of pathology informatics: A global perspective

Background

Evaluation of the association between treatment satisfaction and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) may enable health-care providers to understand the issues that influence quality of life and to recognize the aspects of hypertension treatment that need improvement to enhance the long-term treatment outcomes.



Objective

The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between HRQoL and treatment satisfaction in a sample of Palestinian hypertensive patients.



Methods

A cross-sectional study was conducted, adopting the Treatment Satisfaction Questionnaire for Medication (TSQM 1.4) for the assessment of treatment satisfaction and using the European Quality of Life scale (EQ-5D-5L) for the assessment of HRQoL. Descriptive and comparative statistics were used to describe socio-demographic and disease-related characteristics of the patients. All analyses were performed using SPSS v 15.0.



Results

Four hundred and ten hypertensive patients were enrolled in the study. This study findings indicate a positive correlation between all satisfaction domains and HRQoL. Significant differences were observed between this study variables (P < 0.001). After adjustment for covariates using multiple linear regression, an increase of one point in the global satisfaction scale was associated with a 0.16 increase in EQ-5D index scores (r = 0.16; P < 0.001).



Conclusions

Patients with reportedly higher satisfaction scores have reported relatively higher EQ-5D-5L index values. These study findings could be helpful in clinical practice, mainly in the early treatment of hypertensive patients, at a point where improving treatment satisfaction and HRQoL is still possible.

https://www.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/hex.12324

Relationship of treatment satisfaction to health-related quality of life: findings from a cross-sectional survey among hypertensive patients in Palestine

Purpose Indigenous conceptions of health have been shown to differ from that of their non-Indigenous counterparts. As a result, there remains uncertainty over the appropriateness and value of using existing health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) instruments in Indigenous communities. The objective of this review was to identify studies that either measure the HRQoL of an Indigenous population or validated a measure used to elicit the HRQoL in an Indigenous population. Methods A systematic review of the published literature was conducted to (1) investigate the extent to which HRQoL instruments are used in Indigenous populations; (2) to identify which instruments have been validated in which populations; and (3) to identify which instruments have been tailored for use with Indigenous populations. Results Forty-one studies were included in the review. Only three of the 41 studies utilised Indigenous-specific instruments. The remainder (38 studies) utilised generic population or disease-specific instruments. Four studies found specific HRQoL instruments to be valid in these populations and 32 estimated the HRQoL of an Indigenous population. The limited examples of Indigenous-specific instruments highlighted the potential importance to the HRQoL of these populations of domains that lie outside of traditional measures including social and community domains as well as domains relating to culture, diet and land use on top of more traditional HRQoL domains. Conclusion Ensuring that the HRQoL of Indigenous populations is being appropriately measured is vital to prioritising available resources to the most effective interventions. HRQoL instruments present an opportunity to directly elicit and incorporate Indigenous preferences and conceptions of health into these decisions. Further work is required in the field to ensure that this potential is realised.

The health-related quality of life of Indigenous populations: a global systematic review.

Objective: This paper presents the development of medical informatics education during the years from the establishment of the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) until today. Method: A search in the literature was performed using search engines and appropriate keywords as well as a manual selection of papers. The search covered English language papers and was limited to search on papers title and abstract only. Results: The aggregated papers were analyzed on the basis of the subject area, origin, time span, and curriculum development, and conclusions were drawn. Conclusions: From the results, it is evident that IMIA has played a major role in comparing and integrating the Biomedical and Health Informatics educational efforts across the different levels of education and the regional distribution of educators and institutions. A large selection of references is presented facilitating future work on the field of education in biomedical and health informatics.

/pdf/biomedical-and-health-informatics-education-the-imia-years-3bpng0fkkj.pdf

Biomedical and Health Informatics Education – the IMIA Years

Osteoarthritis knee hip quality of life questionnaire assessment in Egyptian primary knee osteoarthritis patients: Relation to clinical and radiographic parameters

Adaptation and validation of the Moroccan Arabic version of the Psychosocial Impact of Dental Aesthetics Questionnaire (PIDAQ).

The aim of this study was to adapt the knee and hip osteoarthritis quality of life questionnaire (OAKHQoL) into Moroccan Arabic and to determine its psychometric properties. After translation, back-translation and pretesting, the translated version was submitted to an expert committee. The psychometric properties were tested on patients with hip or knee osteoarthritis. Internal consistency was tested using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (α), and the test–retest reliability using intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC). Construct validity was assessed by examining item-convergent and divergent validity and by comparing the average scores between age groups and walk perimeter groups. The study was conducted on 131 patients (115 with osteoarthritis of the knee and 16 with osteoarthritis of the hip). The “physical activities” (α = 0.93), “mental health” (α = 0.84) and “pain” (α = 0.88) dimensions of the Arabic version were internally reliable. The ICC were adequate to good; 0.83 for “physical activities”, 0.65 for “mental health” and 0.70 for “pain” dimensions. The instrument demonstrated good construct validity; all items exceeded the 0.4 criterion for convergent validity, except items 13 and 41 and most of the correlations between items and their own scale were significantly higher than their correlations with other scales. A semantically equivalent translation has been developed with cultural adaptation of OAKHQoL. It is quite reliable and a valid measure of the effect of osteoarthritis on the quality of life on Moroccan patients.

Cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the knee and hip health-related quality of life (OAKHQoL) in a Moroccan Arabic-speaking population

Objectives: Informatics is an essential tool for helping to transform healthcare from a paper-based to a digital sector. This article explores the state-of-the-art of health informatics in Morocco. Specifically, it aims to give a general overview of the Moroccan healthcare system, the challenges it is facing, and the efforts undertaken by the informatics community and Moroccan government in terms of education, research and practice to reform the country's health sector. Methods: Through the experience of establishing Medical Informatics as a medical specialty in 2008, creating a Moroccan Medical Informatics Association in 2010 and holding a first national congress took place in April 2012, the authors present their assessment of some important priorities for health informatics in Morocco. Results: These Moroccan initiatives are facilitating collaboration in education, research, and implementation of clinical information systems. In particular, the stakeholders have recognized the need for a national coordinator office and the development of a national framework for standards and interoperability. Conclusion: For developing countries like Morocco, new health IT approaches like mobile health and trans-media health advertising could help optimize scarce resources, improve access to rural areas and focus on the most prevalent health problems, optimizing health care access, quality, and cost for Morocco population.

/pdf/medical-informatics-in-morocco-5mxycigb01.pdf

Medical informatics in morocco.

Background: In 2005, Medical Informatics Laboratory (CMIL) became an independent research unit within the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy of Casablanca. CMIL is currently run by three persons (a university professor, a data processing specialist and a pedagogical assistant). The objectives of CMIL are to promote research and develop quality in the field of biomedical data processing and health, and integrate new technologies into medical education and biostatistics. It has four units: Telehealth Unit, Network Unit, Biostatistics Unit, Medical data processing Unit. Objectives:: The present article seeks to give a comprehensive account of Casablanca Medical informatics laboratory (CMIL) activities. For ease of exposition, the article consists of four sections: Section I discusses the background of CMIL; section II is devoted to educational activities; section III addresses professional activities; and section IV lists projects that CMIL is involved in. Results: Since its creation, CMIL has been involved in a number of national and international projects, which have a bearing on Telemedicine applications, E-learning skills and data management in medical studies in Morocco. Conclusions:: It is our belief that the skills and knowledge gained in the past few years would certainly enrich our research activities, and improve the situation of research in Medical informatics in Morocco.

/pdf/medical-informatics-in-morocco-casablanca-medical-xivl20gvsg.pdf

Medical informatics in Morocco: Casablanca Medical Informatics Laboratory.

This study is a contribution to the ongoing debate on the application of informatics in medicine. It attempts to outline a theoretical framework supported by a software application of a telemedicine management system. The proposed model is based on a detailed benchmarking of Telecom environments, hardware environments, and content management systems. This approach, which uses open source technologies, helps to create an interface with two entities: web and medical care USB. In sum, for the proposed telemedicine model to be successful, health professionals, telecom operators and research medical informatics laboratories must play an active role in the conception and implementation of telemedicine applications.

M. Bennani Othmani

Papers

Adaptation and validation of the Moroccan Arabic version of the Psychosocial Impact of Dental Aesthetics Questionnaire (PIDAQ).

Cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the knee and hip health-related quality of life (OAKHQoL) in a Moroccan Arabic-speaking population

Medical informatics in morocco.

Medical informatics in Morocco: Casablanca Medical Informatics Laboratory.

The application of a telemedicine management system: the case of a Moroccan hospital unit.