Empowering Health Care Through EHR: Staff Attributes and System Sustainability

Background: Electronic health record, is a digital format, capable of providing timely, accurate and accessible patient data. It is applied by the healthcare providers to manage, and share seamless patients’ information for quality purposes. Sustainable use of this system can enhance affordable healthcare cost, improved coordination, and quality decision making. However, sustaining the utilization of this system remains a significant challenge in middle-income Countries. Training, perceived benefits and user satisfaction are some of the staff traits that affect the sustainability of Electronic Health Records (EHR) in healthcare facilities. Therefore, this study investigated the sustainability of EHRs in public health facilities in Siaya County, Kenya. Methods: Structured questionnaires were used to collect data for the cross-sectional descriptive survey design. While binary logistic regression (including bivariate and multivariate analyses) and chi-square tests examined the connections between staff traits and EHR sustainability. Descriptive statistics provided an overview of socio-demographic features. Results: The study findings indicated that sustainability is significantly predicted mostly by training frequency, While the influence of user satisfaction and perceived benefits on EHR sustainable use varied across settings. Healthcare professionals who received training at least three times a year had a 44.7-fold higher chance of continuing to utilize EHRs than those who only received training once. The probability of sustainability was 30 times higher with an intuitive user interface. Adoption rates were also increased by positive attitude and regular integration of EHR into daily tasks. Perceived benefits by themselves, however, had little effect on sustainability, thus identifying training as the most significant factor.