Healthcare Technology One of the Main Barriers

Healthcare Technology

One of the main barriers to implementing such a plan as described above is the expense of doing so; but that is true only if one looks at the immediate cash expense. The savings created by providing medical personnel with their own Personal Digital Assistant far outweighs the cash necessary to make such a venture a reality. Realistically speaking, however, there will be plenty of medical entities throughout the United States that will be too strapped for cash to make the expenditures necessary for providing these tools to the medical professionals who need them.

A method for overcoming this particular obstacle is presented through the HITECH Act. The HITECH Act was passed in 2009 as part of President Obama's "stimulus bill." The vast majority of the money provided as part of this bill was wasteful and extravagant, going to cronies of the Obama administration as part of a massive 'payback', and the HITECH portion of the bill follows those lines as well. The bill does, however, provide doctors and hospitals with the cash necessary to purchase electronic communication devices (whether one agrees with such use of taxpayer dollars or not). A recent study determined that "under the HITECH Act, every hospital in the United States will be eligible for a minimum of $2 million -- and many millions more for larger hospitals -- to buy and use electronic health records" (Bau, 2011, p. 15). It will be interesting to see if those dollars actually make it to the hospital, and if they do, whether they are spent on communication devices or not.

A problem that could affect the implementation of this plan is the human factor found in almost any project. The human factor regarding the implementation of a plan involving communication technology closely aligns to the human follow up necessary to ensure that any communications are effective (through technology or otherwise).

One recent study determined that "notifying clinicians about abnormal test results through electronic health record (EHR)-based 'alert' notifications may not always lead to timely follow-up of patients" (Hysong, Sawhney, Wilson, Sittig, Esquivel, Singh, Singh, 2011, p. 22). Since the entire premise of implementing an electronic 'freeway' system that connects patients, doctors, administrators and other stakeholders in a fast and secure manner is that it will improve treatment efficiency and effectiveness, then it would make sense to ensure that everyone involved will use the system in that manner.