The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) is an Operating Division (OPDIV) of the Department of Health & Human Services (DHHS). The Agency’s goals are to promote effective, appropriate, high-quality health care; increase access to care; and improve the way health services are organized, delivered, and financed.

AHRQ maintains an application called the Electronic Preventive Services Selector (ePSS) that is designed to help primary care clinicians identify the screening, counseling, and preventive medication services that are appropriate for their patients. The ePSS information is based on the current recommendations of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) and can be searched by specific patient characteristics, such as age, gender, and selected behavioral risk factors. Initially, ePSS was available only as a web application.

Working in partnership with AHRQ, Acentia developed a mobile ePSS application that allows end users, specifically clinicians, to browse and search the USPSTF clinical recommendations from their personal digital assistants (PDAs) or mobile devices. The intended target audience is primary health care providers such as physicians and nurse practitioners.

Background

Before Acentia developed the ePSS mobile application, end users needed to navigate to the ePSS website to view the USPSTF recommendations, limiting access to the USPSTF recommendations to users with an Internet connection. With the release of the ePSS mobile application, end users can now browse and search the USPSTF recommendations from anywhere using their PDAs or mobile devices. The application can also be downloaded onto a memory stick for use on other machines or devices. In addition, end users can receive automatic ePSS update alerts based on a schedule they choose (weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly), either via email or from within the application itself.

One of the key benefits of the ePSS mobile application is the ability for end users to search and save data from the convenience of their PDA or mobile device. Users can search for clinical recommendations, rationale for clinical decisions, new grade definitions, related website URLs and specific patient data such as age, gender, and medical history. It also provides help topics that offer more information on a given recommendation or grade.

To build the ePSS mobile application, the Acentia developers needed to learn the software development kits (SDKs) for the specific PDAs and mobile devices, as this was the first mobile application being developed for AHRQ. The developers were able to quickly master the SDKs, deliver the application ahead of schedule, and fully meet the customer’s requirements.

From a technology standpoint, the ePSS mobile application is intended to serve the end user clinicians, as well as USPSTF, which maintains the information provided by the application. End users are able to install the application on the latest operating systems as well as multiple brands of mobile devices, including PALM, Pocket PC (Windows Mobile), Windows Mobile Smartphone, BlackBerry, BlackBerry Storm and iPhone. For maintenance, the application provides a means for USPSTF staff members to perform the data export and create an email alert to remind users of data updates. This data is reused from existing applications, keeping it accurate and more consistent.

Methodology

The Acentia developers built the ePSS mobile application leveraging industry and client best practices for the Project Management Life Cycle (PMLC) and Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). In addition, the developers used tools for source code versioning (IBM’s Rational ClearCase), change request management (ClearQuest), and requirements management (RequisitePro), as well as the Rational Software Architect (RSA) use case model.

Conclusion

The development of the ePSS mobile application for AHRQ has allowed primary health care providers to access USPSTF clinical recommendations when an Internet connection is unavailable. Because of this application, clinicians who use a wide array of operating systems and PDAs/mobile devices can now browse and search clinical recommendations whenever necessary, allowing them to provide improved preventive care to their patients.

Providing technical expertise as well as thought leadership, Acentia worked collaboratively with AHRQ to plan, design, build, and deploy an innovative solution to support the Agency’s business requirements and organizational mission. Acentia engineers leveraged advanced technologies, and PMLC and SDLC best practices, to develop a high-quality solution across a wide spectrum of hardware and software platforms.