Health Information Group
The research interests of this RIG are concentrated in two areas:
- information behavior in medical and healthcare settings, and
- adaptive or advanced information systems supporting access to medical and healthcare information.
The user groups that interest us range from medical professionals to healthcare consumers/patients and their caregivers. At this time, the RIG has identified the subpopulation of older people as an area of focus, given Pittsburgh's demographics. As Allegheny County is the second oldest county in the entire U.S. (second only to Dade county FL), we have ready access to a large consumer and provider community. We also remain open to a focus on other populations, and recognize that, for instance, the older population and the pediatric population face some of the same technical issues around accessing health information. RIG members are interested in doing descriptive work, identifying the fundamental principles limiting effective access to medical information, as well as research on building tools and systems for information use by these populations, and research on how to effect behavior change in these groups.
The RIG is also interested in medical decision making, and the adoption of health information systems, as these areas present interesting information behavior problems for health professionals and their patients, as well as for information professionals.
Faculty
- Ellen Detlefsen, Chair
- Daqing He
- Hassan Karimi
- Joseph Kabara
- Marek Druzdzel
- Peter Brusilovsky
- Taieb Znati