Transformative Healthcare Technologies: What Implementation Researchers and Practitioners Need to Know About mHealth, Electronic Health Records (EHR), and Big Data Analytics
Thursday 1:30-5:00
Presenters: Patricia Areán, David C. Atkins, Amy Bauer, Kari Stephens, Roger Vilardaga, Jennifer Villatte
University of Washington
Information technology is steadily becoming embedded in routine healthcare. Smartphones and wearable technologies facilitate health assessment and intervention, regardless of time or location. Electronic health records (EHR) and clinical registries store a wealth of valuable data containing potential insights into population health and treatment in the real world. The ubiquity of these technologies in our daily lives allows for data collection on an unprecedented scale, ushering in the era of a new data science based on predictive analytics that extract actionable knowledge from this “big data.??? These innovations are creating new possibilities to advance the aims of implementation science: To translate knowledge about evidence-based assessment, prevention, and intervention into routine healthcare in clinical, organizational, and policy contexts. This workshop will provide an overview of novel health information technologies in evidence-based psychosocial intervention (EBPI) implementation research and practice, with an emphasis on mobile health (mHealth), EHRs, and big data analysis. The goals of this workshop are to 1) introduce promising technologies for implementation science and practice, 2) discuss advantages and limitations of these technologies, and c) provide tips for working effectively with technical partners in academia or industry, such as app designers and engineers, biomedical informaticists, and data scientists. Workshop presenters comprise the core faculty in the Behavioral Science and Technology (BeST) Program at the University of Washington, all of whom are actively engaged in implementation research in the areas of mHealth assessment and intervention, bioinformatics, and technology-enhanced EBPI training and implementation. Taking a team science view, we will not teach programming or technical skills, but rather focus on the necessary knowledge base to promote effective collaborations of EBPI stakeholders with experts in these technical fields. Case vignettes from our own research will be used throughout to provide concrete examples and contextualize recommendations.