Ginsel DE1,2, Barten D1, Kiers H2, Veenhof C1,3
1University of Applied Sciences Utrecht, Research Group Innovation of Human Movement Care, Research Centre for Healthy and Sustainable Living, Utrecht, Netherlands, 2University of Applied Sciences Utrecht, Institute for Human Movement Studies, Utrecht, Netherlands, 3University Medical Center Utrecht, Department of Rehabilitation, Physical Therapy Science & Sports, Brain Center Rudolf Magnus, Utrecht, Netherlands
Background: The personalized model of care challenges healthcare professionals worldwide to provide collaborative, tailored and well-coordinated interprofessional care. However, since healthcare still has a siloed organization structure, in which healthcare professionals work at different places and in different systems, interprofessional communication and collaboration often hampers. In order to create effective interprofessional communication and, in consequence, to enable personalized care, MobileHealth (mHealth) technologies are promising. One mHealth technology that fulfils to the General Data Protection Regulation and responds to the need for a secure way to communicate, collaborate and learn interprofessionally is the messager-app Siilo. At this moment one third of the Dutch healthcare professionals already have access to Siilo. To facilitate actual use of Siilo in daily clinical practice insight into feasibility aspects is needed.
Purpose: To gain a deeper insight into the feasibility of the secure messenger-app Siilo in a population of interprofessional healthcare professionals.
Methods: An observational cohort study was used to determine the feasibility of Siilo. The cohort consisted of 15 physiotherapists and 3 orthopedic surgeons, jointly represented by a Community of Practice (CoP). First, the CoP-members were questioned on their expectations regarding feasibility aspects of Siilo and after three months on their actual experiences. Addressed feasibility aspects were acceptability, demand and implementation of the messenger-app Siilo.
Results: Fifteen CoP-members participated in this study. With respect to acceptability, this study showed that Siilo was unknown to almost half of the participants at baseline. Nevertheless, the majority understood how Siilo worked directly, 33% said that it took them a little while to understand but they can use it well now. Regarding the demand for Siilo, 31% of the participants stated a frequent use of Siilo (≥ once a week) after three months of use. Furthermore, a considerable part of the participants mentioned that Siilo facilitated fast communication, direct contact with other healthcare professionals and a lower threshold to share photos, images and videos. Participants mainly used Siilo to discuss 'patient-cases' in a group chat, to consult each other, and to address an acute question during a patient-consult. Overall, the vast majority expected that Siilo is an appropriate tool to communicate about their patients; 87% would recommend Siilo to a colleague. Finally, the resources needed for implementation, smartphones and the messenger-app Siilo, were to the praticipants' disposal and they were willing to install Siilo.
Conclusion(s): This study shows that Siilo potentionally supports interprofessional communication and collaboration in a secure and user-friendly way. Siilo could facilitate fast communication, direct contact with other healthcare professionals and could lower the threshold to share photos, images and videos. Furthermore, it enables professionals to learn with, and from each other interprofessionally by discussing 'patient-cases' in a group chat.
Implications: Potentionally, Siilo is an appropriate tool to perform case-based discussions and direct interprofessional consultations supported by multimedia within a closed community. In this way it could enable interprofessional collaboration, communication and learning. Taking into account the expanding use of Siilo in Dutch healthcare, further research is recommended on its' feasibility in different populations and varying settings in which professionals collaborate interprofessionally.
Keywords: Interprofessional communication, mHealth, Physiotherapy
Funding acknowledgements: University of Applied Sciences Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands;
Purpose: To gain a deeper insight into the feasibility of the secure messenger-app Siilo in a population of interprofessional healthcare professionals.
Methods: An observational cohort study was used to determine the feasibility of Siilo. The cohort consisted of 15 physiotherapists and 3 orthopedic surgeons, jointly represented by a Community of Practice (CoP). First, the CoP-members were questioned on their expectations regarding feasibility aspects of Siilo and after three months on their actual experiences. Addressed feasibility aspects were acceptability, demand and implementation of the messenger-app Siilo.
Results: Fifteen CoP-members participated in this study. With respect to acceptability, this study showed that Siilo was unknown to almost half of the participants at baseline. Nevertheless, the majority understood how Siilo worked directly, 33% said that it took them a little while to understand but they can use it well now. Regarding the demand for Siilo, 31% of the participants stated a frequent use of Siilo (≥ once a week) after three months of use. Furthermore, a considerable part of the participants mentioned that Siilo facilitated fast communication, direct contact with other healthcare professionals and a lower threshold to share photos, images and videos. Participants mainly used Siilo to discuss 'patient-cases' in a group chat, to consult each other, and to address an acute question during a patient-consult. Overall, the vast majority expected that Siilo is an appropriate tool to communicate about their patients; 87% would recommend Siilo to a colleague. Finally, the resources needed for implementation, smartphones and the messenger-app Siilo, were to the praticipants' disposal and they were willing to install Siilo.
Conclusion(s): This study shows that Siilo potentionally supports interprofessional communication and collaboration in a secure and user-friendly way. Siilo could facilitate fast communication, direct contact with other healthcare professionals and could lower the threshold to share photos, images and videos. Furthermore, it enables professionals to learn with, and from each other interprofessionally by discussing 'patient-cases' in a group chat.
Implications: Potentionally, Siilo is an appropriate tool to perform case-based discussions and direct interprofessional consultations supported by multimedia within a closed community. In this way it could enable interprofessional collaboration, communication and learning. Taking into account the expanding use of Siilo in Dutch healthcare, further research is recommended on its' feasibility in different populations and varying settings in which professionals collaborate interprofessionally.
Keywords: Interprofessional communication, mHealth, Physiotherapy
Funding acknowledgements: University of Applied Sciences Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands;
Topic: Education: clinical; Education: clinical; Education: continuing professional development
Ethics approval required: No
Institution: N/A
Ethics committee: N/A
Reason not required: An observational cohort study was conducted that addresses new and unique developments in practice and education, more specific on interprofessional communication and collaboration. This research does not concern subjects being physically involved in the research or requires participants to follow procedures or rules of behavior.
All authors, affiliations and abstracts have been published as submitted.
