Disparities in Use of Patient Portals Among Adults in Family Medicine

Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine: JABFM

article

Wen-Jan Tuan¹  Mark Mellott²  Brian G. Arndt³  Jami Jones²  Annie N. Simpson² 

[1] Departments of Family and Community Medicine, and Public Health Sciences, College of Medicine, Pennsylvania State University;Department of Healthcare Leadership and Management, Medical University of South Carolina;University of Wisconsin Department of Family Medicine and Community Health

关键词: Digital Divide;    Family Medicine;    Health Information Management;    Minority Groups;    Patient Portals;    Patient-Centered Care;    Primary Health Care;    Regression Analysis;    Retrospective Studies;    Telemedicine;   

DOI  :  10.3122/jabfm.2022.03.210486

学科分类：过敏症与临床免疫学

来源: The American Board of Family Medicine

【 摘 要 】

Objective: This study examined patient portal utilization by analyzing the pattern of time and feature use of patients, and thus to identify functionalities of portal use and patient characteristics that may inform future strategies to enhance communication and care coordination through online portals.Methods: We conducted a retrospective study of patients at 18 family medicine clinics over a 5-year period using access log records in the electronic health record database. Dimensionality reduction analysis was applied to group portal functionalities into 4 underlying feature domains: messaging, health information management, billing/insurance, and resource/education. Negative binomial regression analysis was used to evaluate how patient and practice characteristics affected the use of each feature domain.Results: Patients with more chronic conditions, lab tests, or prescriptions generally showed greater patient portal usage. However, patients who were male, elderly, in minority groups, or living in rural areas persistently had lower portal usage. Individuals on public insurance were also less likely than those on commercial insurance to use patient portals, although Medicare patients showed greater portal usage on health information management features, and uninsured patients had greater usage on viewing resource/education features. Having Internet access only affected the use of messaging features.Conclusion: Efforts to enroll patients in online portals do not guarantee patients will use the portals to manage their health. When considering the use of patient portals for improving telehealth, clinicians need to be aware of technological, socioeconomic, and cultural challenges faced by their patients.

【 授权许可】

CC BY