Joshi Shashank S, Murali-Krishnan Srikanth, Patankar Prasanna, Choudhari Kishor A
a Department of Neurosurgery , Sevenhills Hospital , Mumbai , India.
b Department of Neurosurgery , Royal Hallamshire Hospital, Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust , Sheffield , UK.
Br J Neurosurg. 2018 Oct;32(5):553-557. doi: 10.1080/02688697.2018.1490944. Epub 2018 Jul 13.
Smartphone-based clients are being increasingly used in a medical world for individual as well as group communications. The authors report the use of WhatsApp, a common social media smartphone client for neurosurgical referral service in their Institution. They extend the use of WhatsApp application from a purely intra-departmental informal communication to a formal tertiary referral service for Neurosurgical referrals. The pros and cons of deploying such system are discussed and important concerns are highlighted.
Over a period of one year, the authors record 1412 referrals to the Neurosurgical service at a tertiary referral centre using WhatsApp application. All the data gathered through WhatsApp referrals was subsequently validated and analysed for any errors. They identify eight incidences where the system did not accurately convey the intended information. They highlight the potential issues related to data accuracy and confidentiality encountered in using such a system.
In this preliminary study, the authors consider WhatsApp application as an important tool for Neurosurgical referrals. It is safe, cheap, reliable and user-friendly application allowing seamless transfer of data including clinical videos and scan images to the on call neurosurgical team. Loss of data quality, concerns surrounding patient confidentiality, errors caused by inter-operator variability in capturing data and default prohibition of use of such social media applications in many institutions are important disadvantages in regularly using such service.
Smartphone-based social media clients such as WhatsApp provide a promising future for faster, reliable communication of clinical and radiological data, which can be used for on-call neurosurgical referrals. Integration with PACs applications and facial recognition may facilitate increasing use of such applications in future addressing many of the concerns that currently prohibit their universal use.
基于智能手机的客户端在医疗领域正越来越多地用于个人及群体通信。作者报告了在其机构中使用常见的社交媒体智能手机客户端WhatsApp进行神经外科转诊服务的情况。他们将WhatsApp应用程序的使用从纯粹的部门内非正式通信扩展到用于神经外科转诊的正式三级转诊服务。讨论了部署此类系统的利弊，并突出了重要问题。
在一年的时间里，作者记录了使用WhatsApp应用程序向一家三级转诊中心的神经外科服务部门转诊的1412例病例。随后对通过WhatsApp转诊收集的所有数据进行了验证和错误分析。他们识别出该系统未准确传达预期信息的8起事件。他们强调了使用此类系统时在数据准确性和保密性方面遇到的潜在问题。
在这项初步研究中，作者认为WhatsApp应用程序是神经外科转诊的重要工具。它是一个安全、廉价、可靠且用户友好的应用程序，能够无缝传输包括临床视频和扫描图像在内的数据给神经外科值班团队。数据质量的损失、围绕患者保密性的担忧、数据采集过程中操作人员差异导致的错误以及许多机构默认禁止使用此类社交媒体应用程序，是定期使用此类服务的重要缺点。
基于智能手机的社交媒体客户端，如WhatsApp，为更快、可靠地通信临床和放射学数据提供了一个有前景的未来，可用于神经外科值班转诊。与PACS应用程序和面部识别的集成可能有助于在未来增加此类应用程序的使用，解决目前阻碍其广泛使用的许多问题。
