Ministry of Health Library

Health Improvement and Innovation Digest

Issue 150 - 31 August 2017

Welcome to the fortnightly Health Improvement and Innovation Digest (formerly the HIIRC digest). The Digest has links to key evidence of interest, with access to new content arranged by topic.

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Have you heard about Grey Matter?

We'd like to introduce you to another newsletter that the Ministry of Health Library prepares.  The Grey Matter newsletter provides monthly access to a selection of recent NGO, Think Tank, and International Government reports related to health. Information is arranged by topic, allowing readers to quickly find their areas of interest.  If you'd like to subscribe to Grey Matter, email library@moh.govt.nz

Article access

For articles that aren't open access, contact your DHB library, or organisational or local library for assistance in accessing the full text. If your organisation has a subscription, you may be able to use the icon under full text links in PubMed to access the full article.

Quality Improvement (New Zealand)

Medication-related patient harm in New Zealand hospitals
The purpose of this study, published in the New Zealand Medical Journal, is to identify patterns of medication-related harm from a national perspective, and to use this information to inform decisions on where to focus medication safety efforts.

Shorter Stays In Emergency Departments (International)

Evaluating an Australian emergency nurse practitioner candidate training program
Nurse Practitioners (NPs) receive core clinical training at master's level, with their employer providing the opportunity to upskill in clinical and procedural competencies. It is increasingly recognised that this generic education requires supplementary training for operating effectively within a specific clinical environment. In this paper, published in the Australasian Emergency Nursing Journal,  the authors describe a pilot program designed to train Australian NP Candidates to work effectively within the Emergency Department Fast Track model of care.

The 4-hour standard is a meaningful quality indicator: correlation of performance with emergency department crowding
The 4-h standard performance is a controversial quality indicator. Crowding in emergency departments (EDs) causes increased patient morbidity and mortality. The aim of this study, published in the European Journal of Emergency Medicine, was to investigate the relationship between 4-h standard performance and ED crowding as measured by occupancy.

More Heart and Diabetes Checks (New Zealand)

Predictors of Health Deterioration Among Older Adults After 12 Months of Dialysis Therapy: A Longitudinal Cohort Study From New Zealand
This study, published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases, explored predictors of worse health status of older adults after 12 months of dialysis therapy.

More Heart and Diabetes Checks (International)

Does use of point-of-care testing improve cost-effectiveness of the NHS Health Check programme in the primary care setting? A cost-minimisation analysis 
The objective of this study, published in BMJ Open, was to determine if use of point of care testing (POCT) is less costly than laboratory testing to the National Health Service (NHS) in delivering the NHS Health Check (NHSHC) programme in the primary care setting.

Patient experience of NHS health checks: a systematic review and qualitative synthesis
The objective of this review, published in BMJ Open, was to review the experiences of patients attending NHS Health Checks in England.

Primary Health Care (New Zealand)

Chlamydia testing and diagnosis following initiation of long-acting reversible contraception: A retrospective cohort study
Long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) effectively protects against pregnancy but provides no protection against sexually transmitted infections (STIs). The aim of this study, published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, was to compare rates of chlamydia testing and diagnosis for women initiating long-acting versus oral contraception.

Primary Health Care (International)

Culture-specific programs for children and adults from minority groups who have asthma
People with asthma who come from minority groups often have poorer asthma outcomes, including more acute asthma-related doctor visits for flare-ups. The objective of this Cochrane Review was to determine whether culture-specific asthma education programmes, in comparison to generic asthma education programmes or usual care, improve asthma-related outcomes in children and adults with asthma who belong to minority groups.

Primary Mental Health (International)

Improving Patient-Centered Care for Young People in General Practice With a Codesigned Screening App: Mixed Methods Study
Despite experiencing a high prevalence and co-occurrence of mental health disorders and health-compromising behaviours, young people tend not to seek professional help for these concerns. However, they do regularly attend primary care, making primary care providers ideally situated to identify and discuss mental health and lifestyle issues as part of young people’s routine health care. The aim of this study, published in JMIR Mhealth Uhealth, was to investigate whether using a codesigned health and lifestyle-screening app, Check Up GP, in general practice influenced young people’s assessment of the quality of their care (measures of patient-centred care and youth friendliness), and their disclosure of sensitive issues. In addition, this study aimed to explore young people’s acceptance and experience of using a screening app during regular health care.

Increased Immunisation (New Zealand)

Perceptions of caregivers and providers regarding the potential introduction of the varicella vaccine to the childhood immunisation schedule in New Zealand: A qualitative exploratory study
The varicella vaccine has been proposed to be added to the childhood immunisation schedule in New Zealand as the fourth injectable at the 15-month event. This study, published in Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health, sought to understand the perceptions of caregivers and health-care providers regarding the potential introduction of routine varicella vaccination.

Vaccine Education During Pregnancy and Timeliness of Infant Immunization
Pregnant women routinely receive information in support of or opposing infant immunization. This study, published in Pediatrics, aimed to describe immunization information sources of future mothers' and determine if receiving immunization information is associated with infant immunization timeliness.

Increased Immunisation (International)

Primary care team- and clinic level factors affecting HPV vaccine uptake
This study, published in Vaccine, examined patient-, care team- and clinic-level factors associated with human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine initiation and completion.

Better Help for smokers to Quit (New Zealand)

Smoking in Pregnancy Among Indigenous Women in High-Income Countries: A Narrative Review
Pregnant women in socioeconomically disadvantaged circumstances, such as Indigenous women, have a high prevalence of smoking. Tobacco smoking is the most significant reversible risk factor for the health of Indigenous pregnant women and their babies. This narrative review of the literature, published in Nicotine and Tobacco Research, explored smoking among Indigenous pregnant women in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. It summarises prevalence and factors influencing tobacco use, interventions, and evidence gaps for tobacco control and smoking cessation.

Tobacco retail outlet restrictions: health and cost impacts from multistate life-table modelling in a national population
There is some evidence that the density and distribution of tobacco retail outlets may influence smoking behaviours. This study, published in Tobacco Control, aimed to estimate the impacts of four tobacco outlet reduction interventions in a country with a smoke-free goal (New Zealand).

Better Help for smokers to Quit (International)

Equipping community pharmacy workers as agents for health behaviour change: developing and testing a theory-based smoking cessation intervention
The objective of this study, published in BMJ Open, was to develop a complex intervention for community pharmacy staff to promote uptake of smoking cessation services and to increase quit rates.

Weight Management (New Zealand)

Assessment of health-related quality of life and psychological well-being of children and adolescents with obesity enrolled in a New Zealand community-based intervention programme: an observational study
The objective of this study, published in BMJ Open, was to describe health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and psychological well-being of children and adolescents at enrolment in a multidisciplinary community-based obesity programme and to determine association with ethnicity. This programme targeted indigenous people and those from most deprived households. Further, this cohort was compared with other populations/normative data.

An inconvenient truth: why evidence-based policies on obesity are failing Māori, Pasifika and the Anglo working class
Public health initiatives around obesity have generally worked well for middle class Australians and New Zealanders. This message has not had the same impact in Anglo working class areas and certain culturally and linguistically diverse communities, especially Māori and Pasifika, where obesity rates remain highest. This paper, published in Kotuitui, employs qualitative data from interviews with eighty-five Māori and Pasifika migrants to Australia to explore attitudes to food purchasing and consumption behaviours and associated health risks.

Perceptions and Knowledge of Nuts amongst Health Professionals in New Zealand
Despite their nutritional value, population-level nut consumption remains low. Studies suggest that individuals would eat more nuts on their doctor's advice, making health professionals potentially important for promoting nut consumption. This cross-sectional study, published in Nutrients, aimed to examine the perceptions and knowledge of nuts and the predictors of nut promotion among health professionals in New Zealand.

Effects of a Voluntary Front-of-Pack Nutrition Labelling System on Packaged Food Reformulation: The Health Star Rating System in New Zealand
Interpretive, front-of-pack (FOP) nutrition labels may encourage reformulation of packaged foods. This study, published in Nutrients, aimed to evaluate the effects of the Health Star Rating (a new voluntary interpretive FOP labelling system) on food reformulation in New Zealand.

Weight Management (International)

Technology-based counseling in the management of weight and lifestyles of obese or overweight children and adolescents: A descriptive systematic literature review
The number of overweight and obese children and adolescents has increased worldwide. Obese children and adolescents need counselling interventions, including technology-based methods, to help them manage their weight by changing their lifestyles. The objective of this study, published in Informatics for Health and Social Care, was to describe technology-based counselling interventions in supporting obese or overweight children and adolescents to change their weight/lifestyle.

Childhood Obesity (International)

How Infants and Young Children Learn About Food: A Systematic Review
Early childhood is a critical time for establishing food preferences and dietary habits. In order for appropriate advice to be available to parents and healthcare professionals it is essential for researchers to understand the ways in which children learn about foods. This review, published in Frontiers in Psychology, summarises the literature relating to the role played by known developmental learning processes in the establishment of early eating behaviour, food preferences and general knowledge about food, and identifies gaps in our knowledge that remain to be explored.

Oral Health (International)

Effectiveness of oral health education on oral hygiene and dental caries in schoolchildren: Systematic review and meta-analysis
The objective of this study, published in Community Dentistry and Oral Epidemiology, was to evaluate the effectiveness of oral health educational actions in the school context in improving oral hygiene and dental caries in schoolchildren through systematic review and meta-analysis.

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