Physicians' attitudes towards smartphone-based emergency response communities for anaphylaxis: Survey

Objectives: Patients at risk of anaphylaxis are required to always carry an adrenaline auto-injector (AAI), as the first line of treatment, but their adherence is low. An Emergency Response Community (ERC) is a social network of patients who can potentially help other patients who find themselves without their medication in an emergency. ERC can be mediated by an Emergency Medical Services (EMS) agency or unmediated to provide direct patient-to-patient immediate first aid. The purpose of this research was to study physicians' attitudes towards anaphylaxis ERC (AERC). Methods: A convenience sample of 224 physicians were surveyed using an online questionnaire. Answers were analyzed using ANOVA, t-tests and ordinal regression. Results: Positive attitudes towards an AERC found 88.4% (n = 198) see potential in the ERC and 62.9% (n = 141) think that ERC is excellent and should be implemented immediately. Fewer respondents (6.25%, n = 14) rejected the ERC completely. Respondents showed high willingness to provide patients with solicited or unsolicited advice to join an AERC (78%, n = 175 and 50%, n = 111 respectively). Physicians' opinion about the minimum age to join an AERC is an average of 15.45 years. Leading concerns are 'being left without AAI' (54.5%, n = 122), 'expired AAI' (44.2%, n = 99) and 'wrong AAI administration' (41.1%, n = 92). High support for mediated AERC (79%, n = 177) was found and mediation seems to reduce concerns among the majority (68.3%, n = 153) of respondents. Conclusions: Physicians expressed high support for unmediated AERC. EMS mediation is preferred by the respondents and potentially lowers their concerns. Findings support the AERC approach for patients at risk of anaphylaxis. Public interest summary: Patients at risk of anaphylaxis are required to always carry an adrenaline auto-injector, as the first line of treatment, but their adherence is low. An Emergency Response Community (ERC) is a social network of patients who can potentially help other patients who find themselves without their medication in an emergency. ERC can be mediated by an Emergency Medical Services (EMS) agency or unmediated to provide direct patient-to-patient immediate first aid. The purpose of this research was to study physicians' attitudes towards anaphylaxis ERC (AERC). A convenience sample of 224 physicians were surveyed using an online questionnaire. Physicians expressed high support for unmediated AERC and high willingness to provide patients with solicited or unsolicited advice to join an AERC. EMS mediation is preferred by the respondents and potentially lowers their concerns. Leading concerns are 'being left without AAI', 'expired AAI', and 'wrong AAI administration'.