A 25-Year Retrospective of Health IT Infrastructure Building: The Example of the Catalonia Region.

Over the past decades, health care systems have significantly evolved due to aging populations, chronic diseases, and higher-quality care expectations. Concurrently with the added health care needs, information and communications technology advancements have transformed health care delivery. Technologies such as telemedicine, electronic health records, and mobile health apps promise enhanced accessibility, efficiency, and patient outcomes, leading to more personalized, data-driven care.

Using patient-generated health data more efficient and effectively to facilitate the implementation of value-based healthcare in the EU - Innovation report.

Healthcare services and products are rapidly changing due to the development of new technologies, offering relevant solutions to improve patient outcomes. Patient-Generated Health Data and knowledge-sharing across the European Union (EU) has a great potential of making healthcare provision more effective and efficient by putting the patient at the centre of the healthcare process. While such initiatives have been taken before, a uniting and overarching approach is still missing.

Retrospective analysis of hospitalization costs using two payment systems: the diagnosis related groups (DRG) and the Queralt system, a newly developed case-mix tool for hospitalized patients.

Background: Hospital services are typically reimbursed using case-mix tools that group patients according to diagnoses and procedures. We recently developed a case-mix tool (i.e.

The value of admission avoidance: cost-consequence analysis of one-year activity in a consolidated service.

Background: Many advantages of hospital at home (HaH), as a modality of acute care, have been highlighted, but controversies exist regarding the cost-benefit trade-offs. The objective is to assess health outcomes and analytical costs of hospital avoidance (HaH-HA) in a consolidated service with over ten years of delivery of HaH in Barcelona (Spain).

Methods: A retrospective cost-consequence analysis of all first episodes of HaH-HA, directly admitted from the emergency room (ER) in 2017-2018, was carried out with a health system perspective.

Five years of Hospital at Home adoption in Catalonia: impact, challenges, and proposals for quality assurance.

Background: Hospital at home (HaH) was increasingly implemented in Catalonia (7.7 M citizens, Spain) achieving regional adoption within the 2011-2015 Health Plan. This study aimed to assess population-wide HaH outcomes over five years (2015-2019) in a consolidated regional program and provide context-independent recommendations for continuous quality improvement of the service.

Study protocol of a randomized controlled trial to assess safety of teleconsultation compared with face-to-face consultation: the ECASeT study.

Background: The use of remote consultation modalities has exponentially grown in the past few years, particularly since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although a huge body of the literature has described the use of phone (tele) and video consultations, very few of the studies correspond to randomized controlled trials, and none of them has assessed the safety of these consultation modalities as the primary objective. The primary objective of this trial was to assess the safety of remote consultations (both video and teleconsultation) in the follow-up of patients in the hospital setting.

Excess mortality among older adults institutionalized in long-term care facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based analysis in Catalonia.

Objectives: To assess excess mortality among older adults institutionalized in nursing homes within the successive waves of the COVID-19 pandemic in Catalonia (north-east Spain).

Design: Observational, retrospective analysis of population-based central healthcare registries.

Setting And Participants: Individuals aged >65 years admitted in any nursing home in Catalonia between January 1, 2015, and April 1, 2022.

Is Age the Most Important Risk Factor in COVID-19 Patients? The Relevance of Comorbidity Burden: A Retrospective Analysis of 10,551 Hospitalizations.

Purpose: To assess the contribution of age and comorbidity to the risk of critical illness in hospitalized COVID-19 patients using increasingly exhaustive tools for measuring comorbidity burden.

Patients And Methods: We assessed the effect of age and comorbidity burden in a retrospective, multicenter cohort of patients hospitalized due to COVID-19 in Catalonia (North-East Spain) between March 1, 2020, and January 31, 2022. Vaccinated individuals and those admitted within the first of the six COVID-19 epidemic waves were excluded from the primary analysis but were included in secondary analyses.

Reducing non-attendance in outpatient appointments: predictive model development, validation, and clinical assessment.

Background: Non-attendance to scheduled hospital outpatient appointments may compromise healthcare resource planning, which ultimately reduces the quality of healthcare provision by delaying assessments and increasing waiting lists. We developed a model for predicting non-attendance and assessed the effectiveness of an intervention for reducing non-attendance based on the model.

Methods: The study was conducted in three stages: (1) model development, (2) prospective validation of the model with new data, and (3) a clinical assessment with a pilot study that included the model as a stratification tool to select the patients in the intervention.

Development and validation of a population-based risk stratification model for severe COVID-19 in the general population.

The shortage of recently approved vaccines against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has highlighted the need for evidence-based tools to prioritize healthcare resources for people at higher risk of severe coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Although age has been identified as the most important risk factor (particularly for mortality), the contribution of underlying comorbidities is often assessed using a pre-defined list of chronic conditions. Furthermore, the count of individual risk factors has limited applicability to population-based "stratify-and-shield" strategies.

A Web-Based App for Emotional Management During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Platform Development and Retrospective Analysis of its Use Throughout Two Waves of the Outbreak in Spain.

Background: Quarantines and nationwide lockdowns implemented for containing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic may lead to distress and increase the frequency of anxiety and depression symptoms among the general population. During the nationwide lockdown of the first wave of the COVID-19 outbreak in Spain, we developed and launched a web-based app to promote emotional self-care in the general population and facilitate contact with health care professionals.

Objective: This study aimed to describe a web-based app and analyze its utilization pattern throughout 2 successive waves of the COVID-19 outbreak in Spain.

Performance of Three Measures of Comorbidity in Predicting Critical COVID-19: A Retrospective Analysis of 4607 Hospitalized Patients.

Background: Comorbidity burden has been identified as a relevant predictor of critical illness in patients hospitalized with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, comorbidity burden is often represented by a simple count of few conditions that may not fully capture patients' complexity.

Purpose: To evaluate the performance of a comprehensive index of the comorbidity burden (Queralt DxS), which includes all chronic conditions present on admission, as an adjustment variable in models for predicting critical illness in hospitalized COVID-19 patients and compare it with two broadly used measures of comorbidity.

Performance of quantitative measures of multimorbidity: a population-based retrospective analysis.

Background: Multimorbidity measures are useful for resource planning, patient selection and prioritization, and factor adjustment in clinical practice, research, and benchmarking. We aimed to compare the explanatory performance of the adjusted morbidity group (GMA) index in predicting relevant healthcare outcomes with that of other quantitative measures of multimorbidity.

Methods: The performance of multimorbidity measures was retrospectively assessed on anonymized records of the entire adult population of Catalonia (North-East Spain).

Mimicking insect communication: release and detection of pheromone, biosynthesized by an alcohol acetyl transferase immobilized in a microreactor.

Infochemical production, release and detection of (Z,E)-9,11-tetradecadienyl acetate, the major component of the pheromone of the moth Spodoptera littoralis, is achieved in a novel microfluidic system designed to mimic the final step of the pheromone biosynthesis by immobilized recombinant alcohol acetyl transferase. The microfluidic system is part of an "artificial gland", i.e.

Pheromone synthesis in a biomicroreactor coated with anti-adsorption polyelectrolyte multilayer.

To prepare a biosynthetic module in an infochemical communication project, we designed a silicon/glass microreactor with anti-adsorption polyelectrolyte multilayer coating and immobilized alcohol acetyl transferase (atf), one of the key biosynthetic enzymes of the pheromone of Spodoptera littoralis, on agarose beads inside. The system reproduces the last step of the biosynthesis in which the precursor diene alcohol (Z,E)-9,11-tetradecadienol is transformed into the major component (Z,E)-9,11-tetradecadienyl acetate. The scope of this study was to analyze and implement a multilayer, anti-adsorption coating based on layer-by-layer deposition of polyethylenimine/dextransulfate sodium salt (PEI/DSS).

Degradation of pheromone and plant volatile components by a same odorant-degrading enzyme in the cotton leafworm, Spodoptera littoralis.

Background: Odorant-Degrading Enzymes (ODEs) are supposed to be involved in the signal inactivation step within the olfactory sensilla of insects by quickly removing odorant molecules from the vicinity of the olfactory receptors. Only three ODEs have been both identified at the molecular level and functionally characterized: two were specialized in the degradation of pheromone compounds and the last one was shown to degrade a plant odorant.

Methodology: Previous work has shown that the antennae of the cotton leafworm Spodoptera littoralis, a worldwide pest of agricultural crops, express numerous candidate ODEs.

Characterization of an antennal carboxylesterase from the pest moth Spodoptera littoralis degrading a host plant odorant.

Background: Carboxyl/cholinesterases (CCEs) are highly diversified in insects. These enzymes have a broad range of proposed functions, in neuro/developmental processes, dietary detoxification, insecticide resistance or hormone/pheromone degradation. As few functional data are available on purified or recombinant CCEs, the physiological role of most of these enzymes is unknown.