Mubashir Aslam Arain

Alberta Health Services · Health Systems Evaluation and Evidence

Background. To address the increasing demands for gastroenterology specialty care and increasing wait times, centralized access and triage (CAT) systems, telephone support, and clinical care pathways were implemented to streamline referrals and support management of low-risk gastrointestinal (GI) conditions in the primary care medical home. This st...

Background Surveys can help health researchers better understand the public’s perspectives and needs regarding prevalent conditions such as osteoporosis, which affects more than two-thirds of postmenopausal women. However, recruitment of large cohorts for survey research can be time-consuming and expensive. With 2.9 billion active users across the...

We assessed women’s perspectives regarding early preventative therapy for osteoporosis. More than a third of early menopausal women were concerned about bone loss and future fractures, and approximately half were willing to take an intravenous or oral bisphosphonate around the time of menopause to preserve bone health. Bisphosphonate medications ca...

BACKGROUND Surveys can help health researchers better understand the public’s perspectives and needs regarding prevalent conditions such as osteoporosis, which affects more than two-thirds of postmenopausal women. However, recruitment of large cohorts for survey research can be time-consuming and expensive. With 2.9 billion active users across the...

Objective: The Stollery Children's Hospital in Edmonton, Alberta, introduced the Stollery Awasisak team to provide targeted support to Indigenous families and their children. Talking Circles were conducted across northern communities from 2017 to 2019 to better understand how Indigenous people perceive the current state of healthcare services deli...

Abstract Background Medication adherence is challenging for older adults due to factors such as the number of medications, dosing schedule, and the duration of drug therapy. The objective of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an in-home electronic medication dispensing system (MDS) on improving medication adherence and health perception...

Background: Medication adherence is challenging for older adults due to factors, such as the number of medications, dosing schedule, and the duration of drug therapy. The objective of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an in-home electronic medication dispensing system (MDS) on improving medication adherence and health perception in old...

Background: Medication adherence is challenging for older adults due to factors, such as the number of medications, dosing schedule, and the duration of drug therapy. The objective of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an in-home electronic medication dispensing system (MDS) on improving medication adherence and health perception in old...

Background: Medication adherence is challenging for older adults due to factors such as the number of medications, dosing schedule, and the duration of drug therapy. The objective of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an in-home electronic medication dispensing system (MDS) on improving medication adherence and health perception in olde...

Background: Specialist LINK is a real-time, non-urgent telephone collaboration line designed to link family doctors and specialists. The purpose was to reduce wait times, improve efficiency and enhance the coordination of patient care through enhanced communication between primary and specialty care. The aim of this study was to determine the awar...

Abstract Background Frail older patients are at risk of experiencing a decline in physical and cognitive function unrelated to the reason for admission. The Elder-Friendly Care (EFC) program was designed to improve the care, experiences, and outcomes of frail older adults. The project supported 8 Early Adoption Sites (EAS) in a large Canadian healt...

Background Managing and taking multiple medications as prescribed can be a difficult task for older adults. In-home medication dispensing technologies could help enhance care. The objective of the study was to determine users’ perspectives on a medication dispensing system (MDS) in supporting medication adherence of individuals living at home with...

RÉSUMÉ La légalisation de l’aide médicale à mourir (AMM) au Canada a permis aux médecins, aux décideurs politiques et aux patients de réexaminer les soins de fin de vie. Cet article présente les principales caractéristiques du programme albertain d’AMM, dans le contexte des programmes d’AMM mis en place dans les autres provinces. Nous avons égaleme...

Background The increased use of health information systems and information technology (IT) in healthcare heightens the risk of security and privacy breaches. Necessary measures such as effective IT training and education are required to meet the challenges of protecting patient information. Purpose The objective of the study was to determine the e...

Purpose: Slow changes in older adults’ health status are often not detected until they escalate. Our aim was to understand if e-technology can enhance the safety and quality of older adult care by detecting changes in health status early. Methods: E-technology was implemented with 30 seniors in an assisted living facility. We used wireless devices...

In response to the shortage of healthcare professionals, the Canadian government has supported two innovative health workforce planning strategies: interprofessional education for interprofessional collaboration and recruiting internationally educated health professionals (IEHPs). Interprofessional collaboration is increasingly expected by Canadian...

Carotid artery intima media thickness estimation is a well-established way of cardio vascular disease evaluation. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to develop normal carotid intima media thickness percentile values for a Pakistani cohort. Data was collected at the Departments of Radiology and Family Medicine, The Aga Khan University Hos...

Background: Electronic health records are becoming increasingly common in the health care industry. Although information technology (IT) poses many benefits to improving health care and ease of access to information, there are also security and privacy risks. Educating health care providers is necessary to ensure proper use of health information s...

Introduction: Internationally Educated Health Professionals (IEHPs) constitute a major health care workforce in Canada. Interprofessional education is particularly important for IEHPs to integrate into the Canadian health care system. We designed an online interprofessional education curriculum for IEHPs. The curriculum is designed to cover the si...

Objectives Over the last 10 years, appropriate workforce utilisation has been an important discussion among healthcare practitioners and policy-makers. The role of healthcare aides (HCAs) has also expanded to improve their utilisation. This evolving role of HCAs in Canada has prompted calls for standardised training, education and scope of practice...

Objective The objective of this environmental scan was to identify Western Canadian interprofessional education (IPE) resources that currently exist for internationally educated health professionals (IEHPs). Methodology A web-based search was conducted to identify learning resources meeting defined inclusion criteria with a particular focus on the...

Objective: To compare carotid Intima media thickness and atherosclerosis burden amongst healthy, diabetic and hypertensive Pakistani patients. Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out at the Department of radiology and family medicine, Aga Khan University Hospital Karachi from April 2014 to July 2015. Bilateral carotid ultrasound was don...

Purpose The goal of this evaluation was to understand how four long-term care (LTC) facilities in Alberta have implemented medication reviews for the Appropriate Use of Antipsychotics (AUA) initiative. We aimed to determine how interprofessional (IP) collaboration was incorporated in the antipsychotic medication reviews and how the reviews had been...

Interprofessional Antipsychotic Medication Review Checklist Abbreviations: LPN, licensed practical nurse; HCA, health care aide; AUA, Appropriate Use of Antipsychotics; RN, registered nurse; PT, physical therapist; OT, occupational therapist.

Objective: The objective of the study was to determine whether health care aides (HCAs) could safely assist in medication administration in long-term care (LTC). Method: We obtained medication error reports from LTC facilities that involve HCAs in oral medication assistance and we analyzed Resident Assessment Instrument (RAI) data from these facili...

Background: Road traffic accidents are one of the major causes of mortality and morbidity. A large proportion of accident victims are young people and their morbidity results in a major financial and productivity loss to the society. Therefore this case control study was used to assess the behavior related factors associated with motorbike acciden...

Recurrent herpes labialis (RHL) is one of the most common viral infections worldwide. The available treatments have limited efficacy in preventing the recurrence of ulcerative lesions and reducing the duration of illness. The objective of this review was to identify the effectiveness of topical corticosteroids in addition to antiviral therapy in th...

Wilms tumor and hepatoblastoma are the most common intra-abdominal solid organ childhood tumors. CT examination is one of the routinely performed procedures in hospitals for children with these tumors inspite of high radiation exposure associated with CT scans. Sixty patients (Wilms tumor = 45, hepatoblastoma = 16) were evaluated retrospectively. H...

Objectives This study aimed to identify the perceptions of healthcare professionals regarding the effectiveness and the impact of a new general practitioner-led (GP-led) walk-in centre in the UK. Setting This qualitative study was conducted in a large city in the North of England. In the past few years, there has been particular concern about an in...

To identify the effect of Vitamin D in reducing the risk of preeclampsia in pregnant women. The review was conducted from December 2011 to March 2012 at the University of Sheffield. Studies were included from the Medline data base, Web of Science (Web of Knowledge), Ovid database and Google Scholar. Studies were limited to published literature only...

Background: Road traffic accidents are one of the major causes of mortality and morbidity. A large proportion of accident victims are young people and their morbidity results in a major financial and productivity loss to the society. Therefore this case control study was used to assess the behavior related factors associated with motorbike accident...

Emergency Department demand continues to rise in almost all high-income countries, including those with universal coverage and a strong primary care network. Many of these countries have been experimenting with innovative methods to stem demand for acute care, while at the same time providing much needed services that can prevent Emergency Departme...

To determine the impact of the GP-led walk-in centre (WIC) in Sheffield (England) on the demand for emergency department (ED) care. A survey of patients visiting the Sheffield GP WIC was conducted over 3 weeks during September and October 2011. A short, postvisit questionnaire was also sent to those who agreed to determine if the patient had used a...

The involvement of consumers and the general public in improving cancer services is an important component of health services. However, consumer involvement in cancer research is relatively unexplored. The objective of this study was to explore different ways of involving consumers in cancer research in one regional network. Thames Valley Cancer Ne...

Background: GP led walk-in centres were established in the UK in 2009. Around 150 such clinics were initially planned to open. Their purpose is to provide a primary health care service to complement the urgent care services provided by Emergency Departments (ED), to reduce unnecessary patient attendance at ED, and to increase accessibility of heal...

In Karachi, large employment opportunities, burgeoning population and the availability of cheap labour might be the contributing factors for the increasing prevalence of child labour. A literature review was conducted in 2007 that included published and unpublished literature since 2000. Various organizations working in the field were also covered,...

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of research promotion activities on overall quality and quantity of research output in a clinical department of a teaching tertiary care hospital. Simple research enhancing strategies including regular journal club, research hour, basic research skills training, hiring of research faculty, resea...

This study aimed to develop growth centiles at different gestational weeks for fetal biparietal diameter, abdominal circumference, femur length and head circumference in a Pakistani cohort. Data were collected at a tertiary referral hospital from pregnant women at gestational ages 13-40 weeks referred for obstetric ultrasound as a part of routine a...

Excess lead in drinking water is a neglected source of lead toxicity in Pakistan. A cross-sectional survey in 2007/08 was made of water samples from drinking water sources in Karachi, a large industrial city. This study aimed to compare lead levels between untreated ground water and treated surface (tap) water in 18 different districts. Of 216 grou...

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the knowledge and attitudes of ultrasound users toward safety aspects during routine obstetric examinations. A self-administered questionnaire was given to all registered participants of the 10th Annual International Radiological Conference in Karachi, Pakistan. A total of 306 participants completed the que...

Understanding patterns of career choices in medicine is important for educators and policy-makers to plan the supply of specialists. This study analysed the career choices made by medical students and house officers in 2 private and 2 public medical schools in Karachi, Pakistan. An anonymous, self-administered questionnaire was completed by 850 stu...

Unerstanding patterns of career choices inmedicine is importnat for educators and policy-makers to plan the supply of specialists. This study analysed the career choices made by medical students and house officers in 2 private and 2 public medical schools in Karachi, Pakistan. An anonymous, self-administered and gynaecology were the 4 highest ranke...

In 2004, a review of pilot studies published in seven major medical journals during 2000-01 recommended that the statistical analysis of such studies should be either mainly descriptive or focus on sample size estimation, while results from hypothesis testing must be interpreted with caution. We revisited these journals to see whether the subsequen...

To develop a sonographic birth weight estimation model for Pakistani population and to validate the published models in the same population. Data was collected for pregnant women who presented to Radiology Department of Aga Khan University Hospital Karachi from January 2007 to July 2008 and had undergone ultrasound estimation of foetal weight withi...

Colorectal cancers (CRC) are highly prevalent cancer all over the world and need appropriate and timely prevention and treatment. Since years it has been argued that antioxidant vitamins have a potential role in the prevention of several neoplasm including colorectal cancer though the answer remained controversial. Most of the observational studies...

To estimate the frequency of needle stick injuries (NSI) among health care workers (nurses, student nurses and paramedical staff) in public hospitals of Karachi. Cross sectional, observational. This study was conducted in three public tertiary care hospitals of Karachi, from November 2007 to January 2008. Data was collected by structured interview-...

To determine frequency of carotid artery disease in patients undergoing elective coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) using Doppler sonography. Observational study. Radiology Department, The Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, from January 2005 to September 2008. Patients with known cardiovascular disease waiting for CABG surgery were enrolled...

To assess the clinical radiology research productivity in Pakistan by type of publication, sources of funding and name of journals. A systematic search strategy using key words related to techniques and type of clinical radiology was carried out to identify various studies published in Indexed (Medline) and non-indexed (Pakmedinet) medical journals...

To identify and quantify chromium and lead as contaminant in water sources of Karachi. This water assessment survey was conducted from June 2007 to February 2008 in all the 18 towns of Karachi. In total 216 water samples were collected from ground (n=108) and surface water sources (n = 108). Water samples were collected in a liter polyethylene acid...

The objectives of this study were to determine the characteristics of medical students and graduates interested in choosing psychiatry as a career and the obstacles in choosing this field of medicine. Two private and two public medical institutes were surveyed from June 2007 to August 2007. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to third...

To determine frequency and pattern of non-fatal limb injuries in motorbike accidents victims. Cross-sectional observational study. Study was conducted at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), Karachi, from October 2006 to March 2007. Trained data collectors prospectively collected data from the emergency department of JPMC, Karachi using struc...

To determine the effectiveness of three different methods of ultrasound probe cleaning for the prevention of nosocomial infections. Experimental study. Radiology Department, the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi and Microbiology Department, JPMC, Karachi, from December 2006 to April 2007. A total of 75 culture swabs from ultrasound probes used...

To determine the film-retake rates and causes in digital radiography comparison to conventional X-rays method. Comparative study. Radiology Department, Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, from January 2004 to December 2006. X-rays of different body parts, conducted during the year 2004, with conventional radiography (n=170300), and in 2006 with...

Objective: To compare the effect of long-term (7 days) versus short-term (2 days) postoperative antibiotics in preventing postoperative infective complications in patients who have undergone open-heart surgeries. Design: Interventional, randomized controlled trial (RCT). Place and duration of study: Department of Cardiac Surgery, Dow Universit...