• Ragnhild Alice Bjerk Steinsland
3 year, Master of Health Informatics (Continuing education) (Continuing Education Programme (Master))
ICT-aids can be both useful and important for users with difficulties communicating by voice. This includes for instance patients with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis). These users are a group who can become easily isolated and thereby loose life quality considerably. It is important for these users that ICT-aids are available, and that executive officers in the municipality have knowledge about existing technology. We chose our theme grounded in our experience as nurses in home nursing care. Our experiences showed that some users got access more easily to ICT-aids than other users, and that several users could have gained higher life quality by using ICT-aids. By writing this essay, we wanted to find out if there are any connections who can explain the differences in diffusion of ICT-aids in Norway. To find out more about this theme, we made thorough literature searches. We then did two in-depth interviews with executive officers in NAV Hjelpemiddelsentralen (Government Office responsible for ICT-aids). These interviews gave us a wider perspective, and a basis for further work with our theme. It also gave us important information which we used when designing a questionnaire. The most important data in our Master-essay came from these questionnaires, which were sent to executive officers in all the municipalities in Hordaland and Rogaland (two Norwegian counties). Our findings and the data we collected were structured and analysed, among other ways, by using tables. Our project aimed to investigate indications that there are differences in the diffusion of ICT-aids, and identify where these differences lie. We did this by comparing our data against the theories from Rogers and TAM. We hope that by completing this essay we can identify factors that make it easier for executive officers in the municipality to both provide information about, and distribute ICT-aids. We hope that we can contribute to providing users with communicational difficulties the possibility for higher life quality.
LanguageNorwegian
Publication date2007
Number of pages83
Publishing institutionV-CHI
ID: 9795442