Received 7 July 2009; received in revised form 19 January 2010; accepted 19 January 2010. published online 15 February 2010.
Abstract
Purpose
The objective of this paper is to show that grounded theory (GT), together with mixed methods, can be used to involve healthcare professionals in the design and enhancement of access control policies to Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems.
Methods
The mixed methods applied for this research included, in this sequence, focus groups (main qualitative method that used grounded theory for the data analysis) and structured questionnaires (secondary quantitative method).
Results
Results showed that the presented methodology can be used to involve healthcare professionals in the definition of access control policies to EMR systems and explore these issues in a diversified and integrated way. The methodology allowed for the generation of great amounts of data in the beginning of the study and in a short time span. Results from the applied methodology revealed a first glimpse of the theories to be generated and integrated, with future research, into access control policies.
Conclusions
The methodological research described in this paper is very rarely, if ever, applied in developing security tools such as access control. Nevertheless, it can be an effective way of involving healthcare professionals in the definition and enhancement of access control policies and in making information security more grounded into their workflows and daily practices.
aComputing Laboratory, University of Kent, CT2 7NF Canterbury, Kent, UK
bInstituto de Telecomunicações, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto, 4169-007 Porto, Portugal
cBiostatistics and Medical Informatics Department, Faculty of Medicine, Al. Prof. Hernâni Monteiro, 4200-319 Porto, Portugal
dCINTESIS – Center for research in health information Systems and technologies, Faculty of Medicine, Al. Prof. Hernâni Monteiro, 4200-319 Porto, Portugal
ABSTRACT