A data quality control program for computer-assisted personal interviews.

Researchers strive to optimize data quality in order to ensure that study findings are valid and reliable. In this paper, we describe a data quality control program designed to maximize quality of survey data collected using computer-assisted personal interviews. The quality control program comprised three phases: (1) software development, (2) an interviewer quality control protocol, and (3) a data cleaning and processing protocol. To illustrate the value of the program, we assess its use in the Translating Research in Elder Care Study. We utilize data collected annually for two years from computer-assisted personal interviews with 3004 healthcare aides. Data quality was assessed using both survey and process data. Missing data and data errors were minimal. Mean and median values and standard deviations were within acceptable limits. Process data indicated that in only 3.4% and 4.0% of cases was the interviewer unable to conduct interviews in accordance with the details of the program. Interviewers' perceptions of interview quality also significantly improved between Years 1 and 2. While this data quality control program was demanding in terms of time and resources, we found that the benefits clearly outweighed the effort required to achieve high-quality data.

Patterns of use of decision support tools by clinicians.

This paper analyses information behavior data automatically gathered by an integrated clinical information environment used by internal medicine physicians and trainees at the University of Alberta. The study reviews how clinical information systems, decision-support tools and evidence resources were used over a 13 month period. Aggregate and application-specific frequency and duration of use was compared for location, time of day, physician status, and application-type (clinical information system or 5 categories of knowledge resources). Significant differences are observed for when and where resources were used, diurnal patterns of use, minutes spent per encounter, and patterns of use for physicians and trainees. We find that evidence use is not restricted to either the place or time of clinical work, resources are used for very short periods at the point-of-care, and that use of filtered evidence-based resources is concentrated among trainees.