Public Health and Patient Empowerment

Needs for the 21st Century and Human Factors
Part 1
In my opinion, Andrea could settle for a team bringing on board various key stakeholders. Towards this end, the team could comprise of area clinics and hospitals, sports leagues and boy/girl club leadership, school boards, as well as city councils.
To begin with, city councils would be instrumental in the shaping and implementation of policy to reign in the increase in STI infections within this particular age and gender group. On the other hand, school boards would come in handy owing to the important role that education institutions play in the promotion of healthy behaviors. The former President of the American School Health Association, Rosemary K Gerrans, points out that “school can be one of the primary sites through which children and youth learn about the factors that influence their health… also can be the site that provides or coordinates some or all of the needed health care services” (Birkhead, Morrow, and Pirani, 2020, p. 137). The affected age group is also actively engaged in extracurricular activities such as sports and club undertakings. It would, thus, be prudent to also bring on board sports leagues and boy/girl club leadership as they would help in the dissemination of messages on the downsides of risky sexual behaviors. Area clinics and hospitals are also instrumental in as far as monitoring the problem is concerned – i.e. with regard to testing and screening. They would also play a leading role in the formulation of educational resources and materials, infection control, and evaluation of appropriate treatment approaches.
The CHANGE method could be deployed in this scenario in an attempt to address the increase in sexually transmitted infections in the age group highlighted. In basic terms, the CHANGE “tool provides resources for building community teams, gathering and analyzing information, and developing plans to improve a community’s health” (Alexander, Frith, and Hoy, 2017, p. 227). Towards this end, the said tool would come in handy in the present scenario by aiding change efforts across multiple sectors. In applying the tool, Andrea would first assemble the team I have already identified above and then proceed to formulate the most appropriate strategy to embrace going forward. She would then assess the relevant sectors (in this case home, school, and the community at large) and proceed to collect the relevant data about the present problem. The gathered data would then be assessed so as to assign ratings to the sectors highlighted and the most appropriate strategy/action plan to arrest the situation embraced.
Part 2
The three main factors likely to be influencing outcomes are: facilitation conditions, effort expectancy, and performance expectancy. When it comes to performance expectancy, this has been defined by Lau, Bartle-Car, and Biss (2019) as “the performance of information technology for the user” (78). In our case, therefore, outcomes could have been affected by how acceptable the system was to nurses. On the other hand, effort expectancy has got to do with how easy a system is to use. In the present scenario, this could be thought of in terms of the expectations of nurses regarding perceived system ‘complexities’ – which could have impacted their intention to make use of the system. Lastly, when it comes to facilitation conditions, Lau, Bartle-Car, and Biss (2019) define these as “the degree to which an individual believes that an organization and/or technical infrastructure exist to support their use of the system” (77). In relation to the scenario recounted, there are certain pointers to organizational failures in as far as the efficiency of the system is concerned, i.e. with regard to the failure by the system to provide some key alerts. It is possible that the planning as well as implementation of the health IT did not, in this case, involve all the stakeholders. This is more so the case given that the said involvement of the relevant stakeholders (such as nurse informaticists) ensures that “clinical processes (workflow) can be supported instead of hampered by health IT” (Alexander, Frith, and Hoy, 2017, p. 125).
References
Alexander, S., Frith, K.H. & Hoy, H. (2017). Applied Clinical Informatics for Nurses (2nd ed). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Birkhead, G.S., Morrow, C.B. & Pirani, S. (2020). Essentials of Public Health (4th ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Lau, F., Bartle-Car, J.A. & Biss, G. (2019). Improving Usability, Safety and Patient Outcomes with Health Information Technology: From Research to Practice. Washington, DC: IOS Press.