The DHR program funds research that demonstrates how digital healthcare solutions can be designed and implemented to improve healthcare system performance and patient health outcomes. Our funded research focuses on advancing patient safety, care, and shared decision making without placing excessive burden on users, including patients, physicians, and other members of care teams.
This report highlights research stories that showcase significant findings and impact under each theme. The research stories are identified as completed or emerging (newly funded) research.
- Completed research: 29 grants and contracts recently ended.
- Emerging research: 19 grants and contracts recently awarded.
In 2023, the DHR program managed 101 grants and 6 research contracts across the three main themes:
Engaging and Empowering Patients
Engaging and empowering patients in their own healthcare leads to improvements in safety, quality, and satisfaction of care. Use of digital healthcare tools, like patient portals, smartphones, or mobile apps—often that allow patients to report and monitor their symptoms—can facilitate patient engagement and empower patients and their caregivers to participate more actively in their own health self-management, chronic care management, and wellness at the many points of interaction with the healthcare system.
In 2023, DHR invested $76.3 million in grants and contracts across the lifetime of the projects to help patients, families, and health professionals work together as partners in promoting care improvements over the duration of the projects.
Research Stories by Subtheme
Below are research stories told in the investigator’s own words that focus on engaging and empowering patients.
Technology Solutions to Engage Patients and Their Families in Care
Informing the Future Direction of Patient-Centered Clinical Decision Support Research
Using Patient-Reported Outcomes for Chronic Disease Management
Creating a mobile application to support care transitions for older adults after surgery has the potential to provide timely post-discharge information and allow for caregiver preparedness, better health outcomes, and improved communications between providers and patients and their care partner.
The use of a cloud-based, multidisciplinary care plan for children with medical complexity is feasible to implement and may improve care coordination for children with medical complexity, providing the foundation for a future digital health intervention to address gaps in care.
Using the BREASTChoice clinical decision support tool improves a patient’s understanding of breast reconstruction options, timing, and possible complications, with the potential to significantly enhance their ability to make informed decisions about their reconstruction surgery based on their preference and risk factors.
Sharing inpatient notes during pediatric oncology hospitalization between parents and clinicians has the potential to enhance parents’ understanding of and empowerment in their child’s care, and may contribute to a safer and more transparent care environment.
By identifying and addressing patient-reported outcomes that matter most to patients, this research has the potential to maximize clinic time spent with patients with HIV and chronic conditions to tailor and improve their care.
An integrated mobile health (mHealth) application for remote monitoring of asthma symptoms enables primary care clinicians and clinical staff to effectively monitor asthma patient-reported outcomes between visits, enhancing patient quality of life by supporting symptom tracking and self-reporting.
A technology-based patient-reported outcome system that uses text messaging to capture these data in real time and delivers motivational messages based on responses decreased frequency of smoking.
Implementing an artificial intelligence–supported tool to collect patient-reported outcomes for patients with diabetes is expected to enable efficient delivery of high-quality patient-centered care and improve clinical outcomes.
Participating in an immersive virtual reality experience may increase willingness of emergency department patients with opioid use disorder to engage in medication treatments, including buprenorphine and methadone.
The use of the Peer PLUS (People Leveraging Urgent Support) platform is expected to enhance the connection between those with substance use disorder and peer recovery coaches, assisting in the goal of long-term recovery for these individuals so that they may progress along the four dimensions of recovery (i.e., home, health, community, and purpose).
Optimizing Care Delivery for Clinicians
The DHR program funds research to support clinicians and other healthcare professionals in maximizing their ability to provide high-quality and safe healthcare to patients. This includes research to optimize clinical decision making by delivering the right information to the right people at the right times, so that clinicians can make the best treatment decisions, while also ensuring that technology is designed in a way that supports cognitive work and does not introduce or increase provider burden.
In 2023, the DHR program invested $46.0 million in grants and contracts across the lifetime of the projects to optimize care delivery for clinicians, including research on using effective clinical decision support (CDS) interventions to improve care, using real-time digital healthcare data to improve timely treatment or diagnosis, and technology solutions to improve medication safety.
Research Stories by Subtheme
Below are research stories told in the investigator’s own words that focus on optimizing care delivery for clinicians.
Using Digital Healthcare Solution to Improve Patient Safety
Improving Emergency Care Through Innovative Digital Healthcare Solutions
Leveraging Technology for Personalized, Evidence-Based Care and Decision Support
Optimizing Patient Safety Using Digital Healthcare Solutions
Using Digital Tools to Support Shared Decision Making and Personalized Care
Leveraging Machine Learning to Assess Risk
Using Patient-Reported Outcomes to Improve Care Delivery
The development of a research agenda for precision emergency medicine holds promise to promote needed research in using precision medicine in the emergency setting to improve patient outcomes by considering a patient’s genomic, biologic, environmental, and public health data.
The augmented reality cardiopulmonary resuscitation headset has the potential to improve the quality of pediatric chest compressions, save lives, and improve care equity in lower-resource settings.
Using deep learning and predictive analytics, this research has the potential to activate full capacity protocols in emergency departments before overcrowding occurs, thus avoiding overcrowding and its resultant impacts such as poor patient outcomes including morbidity and mortality.
Implementing an electronic STI risk assessment program in pediatric practices increases STI testing.
Clinical decision support may support providers and patients in making personalized decisions regarding diet goal setting among underinsured patients, with the potential to address dietary behavior change and reduce the rate of obesity.
Successful development and implementation of a clinical decision support strategy to promote uptake of influenza vaccine in pediatric acute care settings may lead to improved influenza vaccine rates as well as provide general considerations to guide clinical decision support for pediatric health maintenance interventions in acute care settings.
Digital nursing surveillance tools can enhance meaningful bedside interactions and improve patient care by leveraging the data to optimize nursing workflow, reduce nonnursing tasks, and boost nurse efficiency.
A point-of-care decision support tool for discontinuing disease-modifying therapies in those with multiple sclerosis has the potential to reduce the risk incurred and the financial burden of those patients using these medications.
The use of an evidence-based clinical decision support tool that uses patient data, including patient values and goals, has the potential to shorten the time between a failing treatment and the use of a more efficacious treatment for children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis, ultimately improving patient outcomes.
The COVID-19 ED return screening tool has the potential to improve morbidity and mortality from COVID-19 infection by identifying, through machine learning algorithms, patients at highest risk of ED return and associated severe disease and decompensation, prompting earlier hospital admission and higher levels of care in the disease course.
Enhancing electronic health records with screening and needs assessment for oncology patients has the potential to answer unmet needs and improve health status using patient reported outcomes.
The ability to remotely collect and review signs and symptoms of lung cancer recurrence using patient-reported outcomes and results of surveillance imaging, coupled with telehealth visits, may improve surveillance guidelines adherence and reduce barriers and disparities in care.
Supporting Health Systems in Advancing Care Delivery
DHR-funded research focuses on advancing care delivery at the health systems or organizational level. Efforts to scale effective interventions across different platforms, promote interoperability, and leverage data and technologies can strengthen healthcare systems and the care they deliver.
In 2023, the DHR program invested $39.4 million across the lifetime of projects on research to advance care delivery and to scale effective digital healthcare intervention across healthcare systems.
Research Stories by Subtheme
Below are research stories told in the investigator’s own words that focus on advancing care delivery at the health systems level.
Advancing Health Equity
Leveraging Telehealthcare to Improve Healthcare Delivery
Optimizing Data Exchange Through Health Information Exchange
Scaling Effective Digital Healthcare Tools Across Health Systems
Optimizing Patient Safety Using Digital Healthcare Solutions
A Digital Healthcare Equity Framework supports users and other stakeholders assess whether their healthcare solutions that involve digital technologies are equitable at every phase of the digital healthcare lifecycle, including planning, development, acquisition, implementation, and monitoring.
By developing and disseminating recommendations around evidence based telehealth guidelines, policies for reimbursement, equitable access, licensure, and practical solutions, this grant may improve telehealth access and quality in Michigan and can serve as an adaptable roadmap for other states seeking to improve telehealth delivery.
Using a nationwide information system of telehealth services and insurance claims to analyze the response and impact of the COVID-19 pandemic may help to improve the healthcare system’s readiness for future public health emergencies.
Evaluation of the rapid transition to telehealth due to the COVID-19 pandemic will inform patient care post–COVID-19 to ensure equal access and high-quality care.
Asynchronous telepsychiatry has the potential to provide quality psychiatric care for elderly patients in skilled nursing facilities by leveraging nursing facility staff and using telemedicine.
Enhancements in matching patient data across disparate health data sources will expand the integration of data, better research data, and give those caring for patients more comprehensive patient health information improving the quality and safety of patient care.
Improving interoperability of electronic health records through health information exchange has the potential to facilitate care coordination throughout the transfer process and improve patient outcomes.
Routine capture of PROMs in surgical patients is feasible and can be effectively scaled across the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program.
This research has the potential to reduce drug–drug interactions involving anticoagulants through a novel shared decision making tool that visually displays, to patients and providers, information on the potential interaction risks from anticoagulants, taking into account a patient’s unique attributes and current medication list.
By making evidence repositories more FAIR—findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable—through technologies such as application programming interfaces, CEDAR helped health information technology developers design new and exciting ways to make the information available where, when, and how stakeholders need it most.
