Exploring the adoption and use of patient portals to promote patient engagement

Technological advances have generated new resources that allow patients to be more involved in their health care. As different innovations find their way into the healthcare sector, physicians and patients experience some challenges as they try to adopt these innovations. One particular innovation in healthcare has been the use of patient portals to increase self-management of different conditions by patients. This study focused in exploring the barriers in the access of the MyChart portal at Baptist Memorial Health Care Corporation and, to some extent, how to handle this problem. An online survey questionnaire was sent to 22 help care desk agents who have been employed with the organization for more than 90 days and face-to-face interviews were scheduled with 5 of these participants. Data obtained from the 19 respondents who responded to the questions and the five interviewees revealed that the major barrier to patient portal access is the lack of computer or phone skills. At the same time, proxy access problems were identified as another challenge.