Case Study Assignment: Hospital Information Systems

Case Study: Hospital Information Systems
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Case Study: Hospital Information Systems
Introduction
Hospital Information Systems reflect the Health Sectors attempt at catching up with developments in IT and information technology. These systems seek to harness the power of IT and apply it in improving patient care and service delivery. As a sector, the health system has an innate aversion to IT CITATION Wor08 \l 1033 (World Health Organisation, 2008). This has been informed by the propensity for IT systems to fail at inopportune times. The result in hospitals and health care centres can affect the mortality of patient. Health sector decision and policy makers have utilized this risk to undermine the need to invest in IT within the sector. The result is a health care system globally that is unable to function according to the needs of its global, modern populace CITATION Vin10 \l 1033 (Omachonu, 2010).
Health sector have attempted to correct this anomaly by instituting huge IT programs that attempt to bring the Health sector into the information age. A good example is the National Health Service (NHS) scheme to implement new ICT services in England at £12.4 billion over a 10 year period. The figure is an astronomical amount to invest in a sector where there is no guarantee of returns. There are limited studies that show an exact and definitive correlation between IT and the accrued benefits to the health care system. Such an investment naturally demands an accounting for in political and economic circles. The investment forces researchers to question if the amount investment is worth the perceived returns from it CITATION Sue13 \l 1033 (Bowman, 2013).
The paper therefore attempts to find answers to these critical questions. Are Hospital Information Systems Safe? If so, what about the failures that previously presented themselves, are these failures a thing of the past? The paper further will conduct an empirical dissection of these systems. The paper will determine if there are, if any, benefits to be gained from the use of these information systems.
Discussion
Question 1 – Salient Facts and the IS Structure
The paper recognizes that the failure of Information Systems (IS) is a result of the complexity of the modern day Information Systems. These failures can be attributed to; over-enthusiasm of users whose enthusiasm often leads to improper usage of a system or the over-crowding of the IS platform where the system does not have the capability to handle traffic beyond a given limit, resistance of users who are unaware of the essence of the Information System, political manoeuvres by stakeholders in the development of a given information system, and fluctuating managerial support for the roll out of a system.
Information systems in the UK are expensive endeavours costing some £22.6 billion per annum CITATION Vic14 \l 1033 (Lane, Snaith, & Lane, 2014). However, despite the high price tag, these systems often fail to deliver to expectations. The systems fails to meet; cost targets, the expectation of the end-user and the time schedule set for the roll out of a system. The paper recognizes through previous research on the topic a number of issues that...