Patient portal message characteristics and reported thoughts of self-harm and suicide: A retrospective cohort study
Autor: | Frederick North, Jennifer L Pecina, Michelle J. Duvall, William B. Leasure |
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Rok vydání: | 2019 |
Předmět: |
Health information technology
Poison control Health Informatics Telehealth 01 natural sciences Suicide prevention 03 medical and health sciences 0302 clinical medicine Patient Portals Humans Medicine Longitudinal Studies 030212 general & internal medicine 0101 mathematics Retrospective Studies business.industry 010102 general mathematics Patient portal Retrospective cohort study medicine.disease Suicide Harm Secure messaging Female Medical emergency business Self-Injurious Behavior |
Zdroj: | Journal of Telemedicine and Telecare. 27:501-508 |
ISSN: | 1758-1109 1357-633X |
Popis: | Introduction As use of electronic portal communication with healthcare teams increases, processes that effectively recognize messages that contain critical information are needed. This study aims to evaluate whether certain language and other characteristics of patient portal messages are associated with expressions of self-harm and suicidal ideation. Methods Using patient portal messages sent between 1 January 2013 and 30 June 2017, we searched for words and letter combinations ‘suicid’ (to identify words suicide and suicidal), ‘depress’ (for depression, depressed, depressing), ‘harm himself’ (or ‘herself ‘or ‘myself’), ‘hurt himself’ (‘herself’ or ‘myself’), ‘kill’, ‘shoot’, ‘cutting’, ‘knife’, ‘gun’, ‘overdose’, ‘over dose’ and ‘jump’. Results Of 831,009 messages, 11,174 messages contained one or more search terms. We manually reviewed 7,736 messages for content expressing self-harm or suicidality. Of the reviewed messages, 3.2% indicated thoughts of self-harm or suicide and 2.2% of messages suggested active suicidality. Of those expressing any thoughts of self-harm or suicide, 13.4% mentioned a specific plan, 20% were passively suicidal. Messages indicating thoughts of self-harm and suicide were more common in patients who were unmarried, non-white and younger than 18 years. Factors significantly associated with thoughts of self-harm were messages addressed to psychiatry or containing the letter combinations ‘suicide’, ‘die’, ‘depress’ and ‘harm/hurt my/her/himself’. Discussion Certain letter combinations and patient portal message characteristics may be associated with expressions of self-harm and suicide. These factors should be considered as we develop systems of effectively screening patient portal messages for critical clinical information. |
Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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