Technological Accessibility and Digital Health Education Associated with the Use of Smart Healthcare by Obstetricians in Peru

De La Cruz-Ramirez Y.M.; Cortez-Orellana S.A.; Olaza-Maguiña A.F.; De La Cruz-Ramirez N.T. · Communications in Computer and Information Science (2022) · DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-18272-3_8

Resumen

This research was conducted to determine the association of the technological accessibility and digital health education with the use of smart healthcare by obstetricians in a high Andean city of Peru. A cross-sectional research was carried out with 276 obstetricians who worked during 2021 in the Huaylas Sur Health Network of Huaraz (3052 masl), Peru. An online questionnaire was applied between January and February 2022, whose results were processed using the SPSS V23.0 program, as well as the Chi square statistical test. It was evidenced that the majority of obstetricians made an occasional use of the services based on smart healthcare during the development of their professional activities (45.7%). There was limited access to computer devices (50.3%), medical applications (56.9%) and Internet connection (50.4%). Most of the obstetricians did not have digital health education training regarding the use of digital health tools (76.1%), information management (79.0%), digital content creation (77.5%) and collaborative network work (73.2%). All the aforementioned aspects had a statistically significant relationship with the use of smart healthcare (p < 0.05). It was concluded that the level of technological accessibility and the digital health education that obstetricians have are associated with the use of the services of smart healthcare during the development of their professional activities in 2021. The digital literacy of health workers is an important and urgent need to improve the quality of patient care, together with overcoming the existing digital divide in the Peruvian population.

Instituciones: Universidad Peruana Los Andes; Universidad Nacional Santiago Antúnez de Mayolo