Health Informatics

This resource provides specialized PubMed searches on healthcare quality and costs. Below you'll find the definitions of the specialized queries available.

• Appropriateness: Defined as content pertaining directly to determining whether individuals who are provided with a health care service had the appropriate clinical indications to receive that service.
• Process Assessment: Defined as content pertaining directly to assessing the process of care for people with a given health problem. These observational studies addressed who did what, to whom, why, where, when and how well.
• Outcomes Assessment: Defined as content pertaining directly to the appraisal of various clinical decisions/management paths and their effects on patient well-being (outcomes).
• Costs: Defined as content pertaining directly to the costs or financing of a health care issue.
• Economics: Defined as content pertaining directly to a comparison of the cost and effects of at least two different forms of service provision.
• Qualitative Research Studies: Defined as content that relates to how people feel or experience certain situations, and data collection methods and analyses are appropriate for qualitative data.
• Quality Improvement Studies: Defined as content pertaining directly to interventions intended to improve the quality of healthcare, including studies of continuing education for the purpose of improving the quality of care. The focus is on the providers and processes of care.