JMIR Research Protocols

Accreditation programs are used by hospitals and health services to be independently reviewed against established safety and quality standards and have been a feature of global health systems for over a century. While evidence that accreditation programs directly improve patient safety and quality outcomes exists, the findings of various researchers remain mixed. Inefficiencies and a culture of “gaming” the system have also been observed, raising questions about the overall effectiveness of accreditation programs and assessment processes. Consequently, exploration of other formats of accreditation assessment, such as short-notice accreditation assessment, has arisen. From July 1, 2023, the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Healthcare mandated that Australian public and private hospitals must engage in short-notice accreditation assessment.

Research is needed to better understand mental health (MH) problems among higher education (HE) students and how to address them. The Observatory on Student Mental Health in Higher Education (OSMHHE) brings together 350 members across Quebec (Canada) and internationally. Its mission is to develop, promote, and disseminate knowledge to foster a culture that supports student MH in HE.

The COVID-19 pandemic has a lasting impact on health care utilization, as both the acute infection and post COVID condition (PCC) can lead to increased demand for medical services due to ongoing symptoms.

Cesarean section (CS) requires perioperative antibiotic prophylaxis (PAP) for the prevention of surgical site infections. However, systemic antibiotics during the peripartum period may induce compositional perturbations of the maternal gut microbiome, a system already characterized by reduced resilience. Data on maternal gut microbiome dynamics after CS with PAP are scarce, largely due to logistical and feasibility barriers that limit the participation of pregnant women and new mothers in conventional clinical studies.

Clinical decision support (CDS) tools that provide patient-specific and evidence-based information to clinicians and care managers regarding patient risk for adverse outcomes have been a part of health care for decades. However, modern CDS, which consists of automated predictions based on complex machine learning models and hundreds of complex input variables, faces obstacles to adoption related to health care providers’ perceptions of lack of transparency and utility. Often, the expertise of data scientists and clinical end users is not well integrated, creating implementation gaps from CDS development to adoption and ongoing implementation.

Despite the growing emphasis on open science and equity in research, qualitative data capturing diverse human experiences and perspectives are rarely reused beyond the original study. Increasingly, data repositories are used to make these data publicly available, but it is unclear whether these data can be effectively identified by researchers interested in secondary data analysis.

As a prevalent side effect, chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting (CINV) imposes a burden on the daily lives of patients with breast cancer. Multiple clinical trials have suggested the validity of acupuncture in alleviating CINV; however, the optimal acupuncture modality remains unclear.

Children and adolescents presenting to emergency departments (EDs) with mental and behavioral health (MBH) concerns frequently exhibit agitation, which poses safety risks for patients and staff and strains ED resources. Validated tools for agitation risk stratification in pediatric MBH populations are lacking, and evidence-based, risk-informed management strategies remain underdeveloped. Addressing these gaps is critical to reducing the need for emergent interventions, enhancing safety, and optimizing care delivery.

As of June 2025, medical assistance in dying (MAiD) is allowed in over 25 jurisdictions across 12 countries, with varying rates of requests and provision. Hypotheses have been suggested to explain these variations, but they are rarely backed up by empirical evidence. As more jurisdictions consider legalizing MAiD, it is important to better understand what factors may explain the evolution of the use of MAiD worldwide with a systematic approach.

Venous ulcers have a prevalence of 1% in Western countries, with a tendency to become chronic and recur frequently. The lengthy periods of healing required for the treatment of these lesions result in increased costs. It is possible that patient education may enhance patients’ understanding of their health condition, which could potentially lead to a reduction in recurrence rates. Nevertheless, it is uncertain whether this constitutes the optimal educational strategy.

Mental health disorders (MHDs) remain a leading cause of the global burden of diseases. Early identification of neurobiological mechanisms mediating a risk for MHDs is key to reducing a lifetime burden. Recent findings emphasize the locus coeruleus-norepinephrine (LC-NE) system as a neuromodulator of arousal translating acute stress responses into neuronal excitability. We propose that individual differences in LC-NE functioning can explain a differential susceptibility to psychological adversity, which mediates the development of transdiagnostic psychopathology in early childhood.

Medication adherence and lifestyle modification remain key in the management of hypertension. Leveraging mobile technologies to improve patient adherence has been found to be effective in chronic disease management. Given the high mobile penetration and the opportunities it provides for encouraging lifestyle modification, an app such as WhatsApp, which is a free-to-use and real-time messaging platform, could facilitate patient-clinician interactions. We present a protocol for a WhatsApp-led mobile health (mHealth) intervention to improve adherence to medication and healthy lifestyles among adults aged 40 to 59 years in Kerala, India.