A Comprehensive System Usability Study of PPM Opioid Calculator

This report presents a system usability study of the Practical Pain Management (PPM) opioid calculator, an informatic tool aimed at improving patient care through accurate opioid dosage calculation. The study employs the System Usability Scale (SUS) to evaluate the tool's effectiveness, efficiency, ...Read More

Running head: SYSTEM USABILITY STUDY
PPM- Opioid calculator
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Executive summary
The relevance of nursing informatics knowledge is related with empowering all healthcare
personnel in accomplishing optimal and high quality patient centered care. It can therefore be
rightly called an intersection between patient care and patient health information. This report
discussed an informatic tool, the opioid calculator of PPM, and determined its value and worth,
by completing the SUS scale.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Description...................................................................................................................................3
Usability.......................................................................................................................................4
Student’s comments.....................................................................................................................5
Strengths and limitations.............................................................................................................5
Recommendations........................................................................................................................6
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................8

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Introduction
Nursing Informatics refers to the specialty that integrates information management with
nursing science and analytical science, with the aim of defining, identifying, communicating, and
managing information, data, wisdom, and knowledge in nursing practice (McGonigle &
Mastrian, 2014). It is therefore imperative in improving patient care. This report will describe a
nursing informatics tool (opioid calculator of PPM) and determine its usability, after it has been
used by a respondent.
Description
Health Information and Communication Technology (HICT) encompass all kinds of
digital technologies that play an important role in supporting the electronic collection, storage,
transfer, and exchange of information, with the aim of promoting health, treating disease,
managing chronic illnesses, and preventing serious health ailments (HealthIT.gov, 2014). The
tool that will be discussed in this assignment is Practical Pain Management. Commonly referred
to as the PPM, it is considered as a premiere online teaching journal. The journal is printed at
least 10 times a year, and was founded in the year 2000. The primary objective of the journal was
to deliver in-depth and exhaustive medical information on a plethora of conditions that involve
pain and their different treatment approaches, and strategies (Practicalpainmanagement.com,
2019).
It is reviewed and written by several pain experts, and the content proves imperative in
facilitating readers navigate different avenues of pain management. The journal has another
potential advantage of providing up to date evidence-based practices and insights into the
multifaceted and dynamic nature of different kinds of pain such as, fibromyalgia, migraine or

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low back pain (Practicalpainmanagement.com, 2019). Several research studies of momentous
importance has been published in this HICT with one focusing on the fact that substance abuse
disorder that comprises of opioid use disorder, is often concomitant with post traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD) and chronic pain among veterans. Researchers conducted at trial and suggested
that administering a combination of naloxone and buprenorphine at a dosage that proves
effective in treating opioid dependency, proved successful in effective management of all the
three aforementioned conditions. (Seal et al., 2016) Another study published in the PPM stated
that patients who attended pain specialty clinics, usually reported greater difficult-to-treat pain
circumstances, and associated psychiatric comorbidities. This recognized the need of including
mental health care by providing specialized treatment to veterans for chronic pain (Arout,
Sofuoglu & Rosenheck, 2017). PPM has a distinct tool, the “ideal” opioid conversion calculator
that is generally used by more than 1 million visitors on an annual basis. The opioid calculator
will be assessed for its effectiveness and usability.
Usability
According to Orfanou, Tselios and Katsanos (2015) the System Usability Scale (SUS), in
terms of system engineering refers to a 10 item simple likert scale that provides a global view of
subjective evaluation of value. Usability is typically measured by taking into consideration the
context of the system being used, the person using the system, the purpose of usage and the
environment in which it is being used. Obtaining a score for the usability helps in determining
effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction, related to implementation of the system. Conduction
of a SUS for the opioid calculation will help in determining whether the tool is beneficial in
providing an appropriate and accurate opioid dosage, for different patients.

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Student’s comments
An analysis of the complete system usability scale (SUS) suggests that the individual
scores for questions 1, 3, 5, 7 and 9 were 4, 3, 3, 3, and 4, respectively. Likewise the scores
obtained for individual questions 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 were 3, 4, 3, 4, and 4, respectively. Upon
adding the total scores obtained from all 10 questions, a value of 35 was obtained. The SUS
score was calculated by multiplying be obtained value by 2.5 that resulted in a SUS score of
87.5. Therefore, it can be suggested that providing accurate responses to the 10 item likery
question that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree, a good score was obtained, which
in turn indicates that the opioid calculator tool of PPM is an effective nursing informatics tool.
Taking into consideration the fact that a score of 85.5 denotes excellence, the opioid calculator
had a score two greater than the threshold, thereby confirming its worth and usefulness for
patients and providers (Kortum & Peres, 2014). Thus, it can be suggested that use of the
calculator helps in pain management, thus improving patient health outcomes.
Strengths and limitations
One potential strength of the opioid calculator is that it is provided free of any charge, for
informational objective. Taking into consideration the fact that opioid naïve people are those
who chronically do not receive opioid drugs on a regular basis, there is a need to prevent
administration of higher opioid dosages, in order to reduce risks of overdose, or even death
(Baumblatt et al., 2014). Hence, the opioid calculator provides the opportunity to gain a sound
understanding on the starting dose of the medicine, its onset of action, duration of action, usual
dozing intervals and maximum daily dose (if applicable) (Practicalpainmanagement.com, 2019).
Another major strength of the calculator is that it provides adequate information on
precautionary steps that must be adopted, while starting with the selected dosage, thereby

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preventing chances of adverse drug events (ADE). Comprehensive details on the classification of
drug, its receptor binding properties, metabolism, and duration of action also adds to the
knowledge.
Nonetheless, one major limitation can be accredited to the fact that the tool can only be
used by trained medical personnel and not by any layman. Clinical application of the data
obtained with use of the calculator becomes the sole responsibility of the practitioner itself.
Therefore, any non-medical personnel requiring immediate information on opioid dosage
administration under emergency situation will not be permitted to utilize the tool. Furthermore,
the calculations are subjected to bias and must be confirmed by practitioners, prior to their use.
Recommendations
The tool must be made more user-friendly to allow non-medical personnel to gain an
access to the data. The pharmacokinetics and mechanism of action must also be explained in
lucid terms, in order to facilitate easy understanding. The tool is also vulnerable to use be
authorized medical personnel who might exploit their privileges and execute unauthorized
actions. The protection of the tool must be strengthened through implementation of auditing
capabilities.
Conclusion
Therefore, health information and communication technology has become a buzzword in
the domain of health and social care. Some chief benefits of nursing informatics are namely,
promoting improvement in major associations with physicians, patients, interdisciplinary care
team members, peers, and families. The opioid calculator of PPM is an effective HICT tool that

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provides adequate information on accurate and safe calculation of opioid doses for naïve
patients.

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References
Arout, C. A., Sofuoglu, M., & Rosenheck, R. A. (2017). Rates and correlates of pain specialty
clinic use nationally in the Veterans Health Administration. Pain Medicine, 18(4), 702-
710.
Baumblatt, J. A. G., Wiedeman, C., Dunn, J. R., Schaffner, W., Paulozzi, L. J., & Jones, T. F.
(2014). High-risk use by patients prescribed opioids for pain and its role in overdose
deaths. JAMA internal medicine, 174(5), 796-801.
HealthIT.gov. (2014). Information Technology in Health Care: The Next Consumer Revolution.
Retrieved from https://www.healthit.gov/topic/health-it-basics/benefits-health-it
Kortum, P., & Peres, S. C. (2014). The relationship between system effectiveness and subjective
usability scores using the System Usability Scale. International Journal of Human-
Computer Interaction, 30(7), 575-584.
McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. (Eds.). (2014). Nursing informatics and the foundation of
knowledge. Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Orfanou, K., Tselios, N., & Katsanos, C. (2015). Perceived usability evaluation of learning
management systems: Empirical evaluation of the System Usability Scale. The
International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 16(2).
Practicalpainmanagement.com. (2019). About Practical Pain Management- Your Trusted Source
for Information about Chronic Pain. Retrieved from
https://www.practicalpainmanagement.com/about

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Practicalpainmanagement.com. (2019). Opioid calculator- What do you want to do? Retrieved
from https://opioidcalculator.practicalpainmanagement.com/
Seal, K. H., Maguen, S., Bertenthal, D., Batki, S. L., Striebel, J., Stein, M. B., ... & Neylan, T. C.
(2016). Observational Evidence for Buprenorphine's Impact on Posttraumatic Stress
Symptoms in Veterans With Chronic Pain and Opioid Use Disorder. The Journal of
clinical psychiatry, 77(9), 1182-1188.