Using drone aircraft to deliver healthcare and other health-related services is a relatively new application of this technology in North America. For health service providers, drones represent a feasible means to increase their efficiency and ability to provide services to individuals, especially those in difficult to reach locations. This paper presents the results of a scoping review of the research literature to determine how drones are used for healthcare and health-related services in North America, and how such applications account for human operating and machine design factors. Data were collected from PubMed, CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Science, and IEEE Xplore using a block search protocol that combined 13 synonyms for “drone” and eight broad terms capturing healthcare and health-related services. Four-thousand-six-hundred-and-sixty-five documents were retrieved, and following a title, abstract, and full-text screening procedure completed by all authors, 29 documents were retained for analysis through an inductive coding process. Overall, findings indicate that drones may represent a financially feasible means to promote healthcare and health-related service accessibility for those in difficult-to-reach areas; however, further work is required to fully understand the costs to healthcare organizations and the communities they serve.

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), also known as drones, have significant potential in the healthcare field. Ethical and practical concerns, challenges, and complexities of using drones for specific and diverse healthcare purposes have been minimally explored to date. This paper aims to document and advance awareness of diverse context-specific concerns, challenges, and complexities encountered by individuals working on the front lines of drones for health. It draws on original qualitative research and data from semi-structured interviews (N = 16) with drones for health program managers and field staff in nine countries. Directed thematic analysis was used to analyze interviews and identify key ethical and practical concerns, challenges, and complexities experienced by participants in their work with drones for health projects. While some concerns, challenges, and complexities described by study participants were more technical in nature, for example, those related to drone technology and approval processes, the majority were not. The bulk of context-specific concerns and challenges identified by participants, we propose, could be mitigated through community engagement initiatives.

Drones are increasingly being introduced to support healthcare delivery around the world. Most Drones for Health projects are currently in the pilot phase, where frontline staff are testing the feasibility of implementing drones into their healthcare system. Many of these projects are happening in remote localities where populations have been historically under-served within national healthcare systems. Currently, there exists limited drone-specific guidance on best practices for engaging individuals in decision-making about drone use in their communities. Towards supporting the development of such guidance, this paper focuses on the issue of obtaining community and individual consent for implementing Drones for Health projects. This paper is based on original qualitative research involving semi-structured interviews (N = 16) with program managers and implementation staff hired to work on health-related projects using drone technologies. In this paper, we introduce a scenario described by one participant to highlight the ethical and practical challenges associated with the implementation and use of drones for health-related purposes. We explore the ethical and practical complexities of obtaining informed consent from individuals who reside in communities where Drones for Health projects are implemented.

Introduction: Testing prior knowledge has been found to enhance learning new, related information. In this paper, we report on the development of a multiple-choice question (MCQ) test of basic science knowledge designed to elicit a particular kind of cognitive processing—distinctive processing—that, we argue, may be beneficial to future learning and clinical reasoning. Distinctive processing entails noticing both similarities and differences among concepts or entities. The recruitment and distinctive processing of prior basic science knowledge may optimally prepare learners to understand, remember and apply new, related clinical information. Methods: We developed two versions of a 19-item basic science MCQ. Both versions of the test had identical stems and correct response options; one version had very similar, plausible or “competitive” incorrect response options while the other version had less similar or “non-competitive” incorrect response options. We hypothesized that the “competitive” test version would elicit more distinctive processing than the “non-competitive” version. We conducted a concurrent verbal protocol to assess the response processes elicited by the two different test versions. Results: We found that the MCQ items designed with competitive or plausible incorrect answer options elicited more distinctive processing than MCQ items with less competitive or less plausible incorrect response options. Discussion: We showed that tests can be designed to promote cognitive processes that may be beneficial for future learning and that concurrent verbal protocols can be used to collect response process validity evidence for formative tests.