Information Technology for Polypharmacy Appropriateness: What Factors Affect the Use of INTERCheckWEB?

Background: INTERCheckWEB is one of the most outstanding IT innovative technology that can be implemented at hospital level, supporting the clinicians in the evaluation of the therapy appropriateness for a patient, specially reducing the potentially inappropriate prescriptions for elderly patients in polytherapy. The present paper aims at investigating the relationship between physicians and support decision system in therapy appropriateness for elderly patients in polytherapy, in order to is to assess the factors that can foster or hamper physicians in using INTERCheckWEB for drug prescription.Methods: A qualitative questionnaire based on a model broadly addressed in literature (Technology Acceptance Model – TAM2), was administered to seventy clinicians referring to Internal Medicine wards, of four Italian medium size hospitals. Based on TAM2, authors assess how perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, image and output quality, affect INTERCheckWeb intention to use. Inferential analyses were conducted to define the main aspects useful to understand the factors impacting on INTERCheckWeb adoption in clinical practice.Results: The regression analysis reported that image, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness, as well as the moderator effect of the voluntary use between the perceived usefulness and the intention to use, are the factors that most influenced the use of INTERCheckWEB (Adjusted R2 = 0.870).Conclusions: The analysis has demonstrated that clinicians would effectively use INTERCheckWEB, when available, to identify all the information that could be dangerous for the patient, choosing the proper drug and preventing potential interactions and medical errors.