Decision support patients response

Imagine a fully developed IT system where all important information on an individual person s health-related aspects are stored, easy searchable and safely available for communication and systematic support for decisions and also follow up of interventions, by the patient and health care providers. Of course there are several potential drawbacks to this but from a patient health care perspective the benefits are clear. In UK a large scale IT project Connecting for Health are supposed to support the UK-NHS in providing better, safer care, by delivering computer systems and services that improve how patient information is stored and accessed (NHS 2004). This could be one way to start up. However the patient perspective on, communication, learning, responsibility, knowledge, follow-up on effects etcetera must be supported. 

Prevention of disease is of course very important and the individual have a responsibility for their own health in a short and long perspective. The health care system has to support the individual to make correct decision and also to further help them when disease is evident. The cornerstone to this is surgery and medication treatment. As described in Chapter 3 there are requirements for documentation of new medications when used in the elderly. However those controlled trials will always be artificial and we need more evidences and comparisons from normal clinical use based on populations and individuals. This information could be gathered continuously if the patient care supportive IT system really was supportive. 

Patients with PTSD who respond to pharmacotherapy should continue treatment for at least 12 months. If residual symptoms persist, drug therapy should be continued for at least 24 months. The decision about when to discontinue therapy is based on response to therapy, presence of ongoing stresses, and adverse effects. The patient must be confident in the discontinuation plan and requires extra support throughout the process. Drug therapy should be withdrawn and tapered slowly over a period of at least 1 month to reduce the potential for relapse. ... 

Controllers must also have the resources and information necessary to enforce the safety constraints they have been assigned. Physicians need information about drug safety and efficacy that is independent from the pharmaceutical company representatives in order to adequately protect their patients. One of the first steps in performing an analysis of the drug safety control structure is to identify the contextual factors that can influence whether each component s responsibilities are carried out and the information required to create an accurate process model to support informed decision making in exercising the controls they have available to carry out their responsibilities. 

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