abstract: 'Background: Studies have sought to define information needs of health

  workers within very specific settings or projects. Lacking in the

  literature is how hospitals in low-income settings are able to meet the

  information needs of their staff and the use of information

  communication technologies (ICT) in day-to-day information searching.

  Objective: The study aimed to explore where professionals in Kenyan

  hospitals turn to for work-related information in their day-to-day work.

  Additionally, it examined what existing solutions are provided by

  hospitals with regard to provision of best practice care. Lastly, the

  study explored the use of ICT in information searching.

  Design: Data for this study were collected in July 2012.

  Self-administered questionnaires (SAQs) were distributed across 22 study

  hospitals with an aim to get a response from 34 health workers per

  hospital.

  Results: SAQs were collected from 657 health workers. The most popular

  sources of information to guide work were fellow health workers and

  printed guidelines while the least popular were scientific journals. Of

  value to health workers were: national treatment policies, new research

  findings, regular reports from surveillance data, information on costs

  of services and information on their performance of routine clinical

  tasks; however, hospitals only partially met these needs. Barriers to

  accessing information sources included: `not available/difficult to get''

  and `difficult to understand''. ICT use for information seeking was

  reported and with demographic specific differences noted from the

  multivariate logistic regression model; nurses compared to medical

  doctors and older workers were less likely to use ICT for health

  information searching. Barriers to accessing Internet were identified

  as: high costs and the lack of the service at home or at work.

  Conclusions: Hospitals need to provide appropriate information by

  improving information dissemination efforts and providing an enabling

  environment that allows health workers find the information they need

  for best practice.'
affiliation: 'Muinga, N (Corresponding Author), KEMRI Wellcome Trust Res Programme,
  Dept Publ Hlth Res, POB 43640, Nairobi 00100, Kenya.

  Muinga, Naomi; Ayieko, Philip; English, Mike, KEMRI Wellcome Trust Res Programme,
  Dept Publ Hlth Res, Nairobi 00100, Kenya.

  Sen, Barbara, Univ Sheffield, Informat Sch, Sheffield, S Yorkshire, England.

  Todd, Jim, Univ London London Sch Hyg \& Trop Med, Dept Populat Hlth, London WC1E
  7HT, England.

  English, Mike, Univ Oxford, Dept Paediat, Oxford, England.

  English, Mike, Univ Oxford, Nuffield Dept Med, Oxford, England.'
article-number: '26559'
author: Muinga, Naomi and Sen, Barbara and Ayieko, Philip and Todd, Jim and English,
  Mike
author-email: nmuinga@kemri-wellcome.org
author_list:
- family: Muinga
  given: Naomi
- family: Sen
  given: Barbara
- family: Ayieko
  given: Philip
- family: Todd
  given: Jim
- family: English
  given: Mike
da: '2023-09-28'
doi: 10.3402/gha.v8.26559
files: []
issn: 1654-9880
journal: GLOBAL HEALTH ACTION
keywords: 'health information; information needs of health workers; ICT;

  information sources; information seeking'
keywords-plus: 'HEALTH-CARE PROVIDERS; DEVELOPING-COUNTRIES; SEEKING BEHAVIOR;

  DEVELOPING-WORLD; NEEDS; WORKERS; PRACTITIONERS; GUIDELINES; PROGRAM;

  LIFE'
language: English
number-of-cited-references: '33'
orcid-numbers: 'Muinga, Naomi/0000-0002-0749-0255

  Todd, Jim/0000-0001-5918-4914

  English, Michael/0000-0002-7427-0826'
papis_id: 10bbbbb15a295acaca4f5b606ea3b0ce
ref: Muinga2015accessvalue
researcherid-numbers: 'Muinga, Naomi/J-1263-2019

  '
times-cited: '3'
title: Access to and value of information to support good practice for staff in Kenyan
  hospitals
type: article
unique-id: WOS:000354645600001
usage-count-last-180-days: '0'
usage-count-since-2013: '14'
volume: '8'
web-of-science-categories: Public, Environmental \& Occupational Health
year: '2015'