UAB General Surgery Chief Resident Frank Gleason, M.D., MSPH, recently presented his paper “Patient factors related to patient engagement technology (PET) usage in thoracic surgery” at the 103rd annual meeting of the American Association of Thoracic Surgery. This year’s meeting took place in Los Angeles, California, from May 6-9, 2023.

The project examined the characteristics, including health literacy, of thoracic surgery patients who utilized the Seamless MD interface to complete patient-reported outcome (PRO) surveys. Results from the 703 patients enrolled in the study showed adequate health literacy and white race were independent factors associated with higher rates of survey completion, while male gender was associated with lower rates of survey completion.

Gleason’s mentors on this project were Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery Associate faculty Drs. Jim Donahue and Ben Wei.

“It was an honor to present at the conference and conduct research on how we can best connect with our patients,” says Gleason. “Patient engagement technology, like SeamlessMD, can be an effective means of collecting patient reported outcomes, but we must be aware of the patient-level factors that impact their usage.”