Broadening the reach of patient portals: Opportunities for self-test delivery, screening, and research (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Patient portals are widely used for patient engagement in healthcare. However, patient perspectives on using portals for research purposes, health-related screenings, and patient-initiated self-testing is under studied. It is critical to understand patient perspectives on the use of portals to expand access to care. OBJECTIVE To understand patient perspectives on using portals for research purposes, health-related screenings, and patient-initiated self-testing. METHODS Patients (N=105) from the Patient Engaged Research Center at a large, urban midwestern health system completed a 23-question online survey on patient portal (MyChart) use, willingness to use the patient portal for research-purposes, risk assessments, and self-test kits. Binomial and multinomial regressions were run to determine whether demographic characteristics were associated with how and why patients access MyChart, likelihood of completing risk assessments on MyChart, and interest in receiving self-test kits. RESULTS Increasing age was negatively associated with MyChart use, interest in receiving self-test kits for alcohol and illicit drug use and willingness to complete risk assessments for alcohol and tobacco use, depression, stress, anxiety, sleep, and sexual history. Race and gender were not significantly associated with willingness to answer risk assessments in MyChart. CONCLUSIONS The lack of significant findings based on race and gender suggests that patient portals may be an acceptable method of recruiting for and conducting research. Allowing patients to request self-test kits and complete risk assessments in portals may help patients to take agency over their healthcare. Future research should examine if patient portal recruitment may help to address persistent biases in clinical trial recruitment, to increase enrollment of women and racial minorities. Patient portals may be used for research recruitment, sending research-related information, and engaging patients to answer risk assessments, read about health information, and complete other clinical tasks.