- Email: [email protected]
The impact of new ICT technologies and its applications on health service development and management
Technological Forecasting & Social Change xxx (xxxx) xxx–xxx
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Technological Forecasting & Social Change journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/techfore
The impact of new ICT technologies and its applications on health service development and management
Health care systems worldwide face major challenges in part due to consumer demands for services, 24-hour services, innovation in service delivery and treatments, and access to more information. Concurrently, rising costs have made health care unaffordable for many individuals. One result of these market changes is an increased reliance on health-related websites, often as a substitute to a visit to a clinic. Luckily, new advancements in information and communication technologies (ICTs) and applications hold the potential to continuously improve health care, and provide universal access to healthcare information. Accelerating the application of Web technologies such as Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 to the health care providers offer the hope of assisting service providers to deal with overwhelming, system-wide challenges. Answering the call for ICT's to improve communities, this special issue examines ICT's potential to assist healthcare provision. One of the ICT technologies is the online communities afforded social media. Social media, particularly social networking sites are attracting more individuals to online health communities, contributing to an increase in the productivity of modern health care and reducing transaction costs. Many health sectors now take advantage of recent ICT advances in e-health provision in an effort to reduce cost. From the consumer perspective, empowering people to manage their own health via new technologies and receive some services via Internet content, can result in more cost-effective healthcare systems and even improve health outcomes. This merging of health care delivery systems and rapidly advancing Web technologies drives the need for further research into factors which affect the development, delivery and usage of healthcare ICTs. The use of new Web technologies, applications, and social media in developing online health communities holds the promise of improved health care provision. Therefore, we have decided to develop a special issue to explore concepts and practices related to the impact of new ICT technologies and its applications on health service development and management where participants in the health network are linked to each other through new ICT technologies. The list of papers selected for this special issue are next listed. Each manuscript was rigorously peer reviewed. The first paper by Ye Hou, ping gao, Brian Nicholson is “Understanding Organisational Responses to Regulative Pressures in Information Security Management: The Case of a Chinese Hospital”. Drawing on institutional theory, they conduct a case study of information security management (ISM) in a Chinese hospital. A theoretical framework is presented in this paper, which proposes that organisational response strategies devised in response to regulative pressures are determined jointly by internal organisational incentives and external government supervision and enforcement. The second paper by Mauro Falasca and John F Kros is “Success Factors and Performance Outcomes of Healthcare Industrial Vending Systems: An Empirical Analysis.” This paper is investigates a series of success factors and performance outcomes associated with the implementation of a healthcare Industrial Vending System (IVS). Grounded in Transaction Cost Economics (TCE), a survey instrument was developed based on earlier work on Vendor-Managed Inventory (VMI) success. A sample of 91 users of healthcare IVS's was used to test the proposed research model. The empirically tested structural model results were confirmed, from a buyer's perspective, that healthcare IVS implementation success is strongly tied to the quality of the information generated by the IVS and the quality of the buyer-vendor relationship. Findings also indicate that successful healthcare IVS implementation can result in improved inventory control, increased levels of customer service, and tighter cost control. The third paper by Yichuan Wang, LeeAnn Kung is “Big Data Analytics: Understanding Its Capabilities and Potential Benefits for Healthcare Organizations.”. This paper examines the historical development, architectural design and component functionalities of big data analytics. From a content analysis of 26 big data implementation cases in healthcare, the authors identified five big data analytics capabilities: analytical capability for patterns of care, unstructured data analytical capability, decision support capability, predictive capability, and traceability. The authors mapped the benefits driven by big data analytics in terms of information technology (IT) infrastructure, operational, organisational, managerial and strategic areas. This research finally recommends five strategies for healthcare organizations that are considering whether to adopt big data analytics technologies. The research findings, recommendations and implications will help healthcare organizations understand the capabilities and potential benefits of big data analytics and support healthcare administrators seeking to formulate effective strategies for data-driven analytics. As such, the contributions of these authors provide a great service to the healthcare industry. The next paper by Julian Sims is “Communities of Practice, Telemedicine and Online Medical Communities.”. In this paper the author introduces a virtual medical community that enables geographically-dispersed medical experts to collaborate and share their knowledge in order to improve health care provision. This research confirms that media richness is not required for sustainable communities of practice, that there is greater effectiveness in knowledge sharing when virtual medical communities develop into communities of practice. Further, communities of practice are sustainable when shared knowledge enhances medical practice. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2017.09.015
0040-1625/ © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Technological Forecasting & Social Change xxx (xxxx) xxx–xxx
The fourth paper is “Seeking and Sharing Health Information on Social Media: A Net Valence Model and Cross-Cultural Comparison” by Yibai Li, Xuequn Wang, Xiaolin Lin, Mohammad Hajli focuses on the factors that affect users' intentions to seek and share health information on social media. A net valence model was developed based on social support theory and prior e-service adoption research. Two studies, one in China and the other in Italy, were conducted to test the model and results reveal important cultural differences. Results indicate that the proposed net valence model can effectively explain users' intentions to seek and share health information on social media. An extensive literature review identified that this study is among the first to investigate the non-healthcare professionals' intentions to seek and share health information in the context of social media using cross culture samples. The final paper by Kofi Osei-Frimpong, Alan Wilson and Fred Lemke is “Patient co-creation activities in healthcare service delivery at the micro level: the influence of online access to healthcare information.” examines patients' desire to seek health information largely driven by increased access via the Internet and the cumulative impacts on value co-creation. In this research the authors employed a sequential exploratory design involving a phenomenological approach in the qualitative phase, followed by a quantitative survey design to further our understanding of the influence of technology in co-creating value in healthcare at the micro level. The findings suggest pre-encounter information search impacts positively on improved service engagement and commitment to compliance with medical instructions. It does this by shaping the nature of interactions; enhancing provider-patient orientation; and increasing their involvement in a shared decision-making process. From a theoretical perspective, this study integrates multiple research perspectives (e.g., access to information, online information seeking and knowledge creation, healthcare consultation models, etc.) and extends research on patient integration, participation, and co-creation of value. The conceptualization of value cocreation activities in this study suggests a need for service providers to adopt delivery approaches that would effectively integrate patient resources to co-create value. The co-editors are thankful for the submission of many quality papers and hope that each author benefited from the submission and review process. While only five very good papers are published in this special section, we hope that all authors benefitted from the process by the exercise of refining their research. The selected papers make a significant contribution to the work and studies conducted by scholars in the area of social commerce. Our special thanks go to Professor Fred Philip, Editor in Chief of Technological Forecasting and Social Change, an international journal and the authors that considered this special issue. Nick Hajli,, Mauricio S. Featherman School of Management, Swansea University, UK Washington State University, USA E-mail address: [email protected]
⁎
Corresponding author.
2
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Technological Forecasting & Social Change journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/techfore
The impact of new ICT technologies and its applications on health service development and management
Health care systems worldwide face major challenges in part due to consumer demands for services, 24-hour services, innovation in service delivery and treatments, and access to more information. Concurrently, rising costs have made health care unaffordable for many individuals. One result of these market changes is an increased reliance on health-related websites, often as a substitute to a visit to a clinic. Luckily, new advancements in information and communication technologies (ICTs) and applications hold the potential to continuously improve health care, and provide universal access to healthcare information. Accelerating the application of Web technologies such as Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 to the health care providers offer the hope of assisting service providers to deal with overwhelming, system-wide challenges. Answering the call for ICT's to improve communities, this special issue examines ICT's potential to assist healthcare provision. One of the ICT technologies is the online communities afforded social media. Social media, particularly social networking sites are attracting more individuals to online health communities, contributing to an increase in the productivity of modern health care and reducing transaction costs. Many health sectors now take advantage of recent ICT advances in e-health provision in an effort to reduce cost. From the consumer perspective, empowering people to manage their own health via new technologies and receive some services via Internet content, can result in more cost-effective healthcare systems and even improve health outcomes. This merging of health care delivery systems and rapidly advancing Web technologies drives the need for further research into factors which affect the development, delivery and usage of healthcare ICTs. The use of new Web technologies, applications, and social media in developing online health communities holds the promise of improved health care provision. Therefore, we have decided to develop a special issue to explore concepts and practices related to the impact of new ICT technologies and its applications on health service development and management where participants in the health network are linked to each other through new ICT technologies. The list of papers selected for this special issue are next listed. Each manuscript was rigorously peer reviewed. The first paper by Ye Hou, ping gao, Brian Nicholson is “Understanding Organisational Responses to Regulative Pressures in Information Security Management: The Case of a Chinese Hospital”. Drawing on institutional theory, they conduct a case study of information security management (ISM) in a Chinese hospital. A theoretical framework is presented in this paper, which proposes that organisational response strategies devised in response to regulative pressures are determined jointly by internal organisational incentives and external government supervision and enforcement. The second paper by Mauro Falasca and John F Kros is “Success Factors and Performance Outcomes of Healthcare Industrial Vending Systems: An Empirical Analysis.” This paper is investigates a series of success factors and performance outcomes associated with the implementation of a healthcare Industrial Vending System (IVS). Grounded in Transaction Cost Economics (TCE), a survey instrument was developed based on earlier work on Vendor-Managed Inventory (VMI) success. A sample of 91 users of healthcare IVS's was used to test the proposed research model. The empirically tested structural model results were confirmed, from a buyer's perspective, that healthcare IVS implementation success is strongly tied to the quality of the information generated by the IVS and the quality of the buyer-vendor relationship. Findings also indicate that successful healthcare IVS implementation can result in improved inventory control, increased levels of customer service, and tighter cost control. The third paper by Yichuan Wang, LeeAnn Kung is “Big Data Analytics: Understanding Its Capabilities and Potential Benefits for Healthcare Organizations.”. This paper examines the historical development, architectural design and component functionalities of big data analytics. From a content analysis of 26 big data implementation cases in healthcare, the authors identified five big data analytics capabilities: analytical capability for patterns of care, unstructured data analytical capability, decision support capability, predictive capability, and traceability. The authors mapped the benefits driven by big data analytics in terms of information technology (IT) infrastructure, operational, organisational, managerial and strategic areas. This research finally recommends five strategies for healthcare organizations that are considering whether to adopt big data analytics technologies. The research findings, recommendations and implications will help healthcare organizations understand the capabilities and potential benefits of big data analytics and support healthcare administrators seeking to formulate effective strategies for data-driven analytics. As such, the contributions of these authors provide a great service to the healthcare industry. The next paper by Julian Sims is “Communities of Practice, Telemedicine and Online Medical Communities.”. In this paper the author introduces a virtual medical community that enables geographically-dispersed medical experts to collaborate and share their knowledge in order to improve health care provision. This research confirms that media richness is not required for sustainable communities of practice, that there is greater effectiveness in knowledge sharing when virtual medical communities develop into communities of practice. Further, communities of practice are sustainable when shared knowledge enhances medical practice. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2017.09.015
0040-1625/ © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Technological Forecasting & Social Change xxx (xxxx) xxx–xxx
The fourth paper is “Seeking and Sharing Health Information on Social Media: A Net Valence Model and Cross-Cultural Comparison” by Yibai Li, Xuequn Wang, Xiaolin Lin, Mohammad Hajli focuses on the factors that affect users' intentions to seek and share health information on social media. A net valence model was developed based on social support theory and prior e-service adoption research. Two studies, one in China and the other in Italy, were conducted to test the model and results reveal important cultural differences. Results indicate that the proposed net valence model can effectively explain users' intentions to seek and share health information on social media. An extensive literature review identified that this study is among the first to investigate the non-healthcare professionals' intentions to seek and share health information in the context of social media using cross culture samples. The final paper by Kofi Osei-Frimpong, Alan Wilson and Fred Lemke is “Patient co-creation activities in healthcare service delivery at the micro level: the influence of online access to healthcare information.” examines patients' desire to seek health information largely driven by increased access via the Internet and the cumulative impacts on value co-creation. In this research the authors employed a sequential exploratory design involving a phenomenological approach in the qualitative phase, followed by a quantitative survey design to further our understanding of the influence of technology in co-creating value in healthcare at the micro level. The findings suggest pre-encounter information search impacts positively on improved service engagement and commitment to compliance with medical instructions. It does this by shaping the nature of interactions; enhancing provider-patient orientation; and increasing their involvement in a shared decision-making process. From a theoretical perspective, this study integrates multiple research perspectives (e.g., access to information, online information seeking and knowledge creation, healthcare consultation models, etc.) and extends research on patient integration, participation, and co-creation of value. The conceptualization of value cocreation activities in this study suggests a need for service providers to adopt delivery approaches that would effectively integrate patient resources to co-create value. The co-editors are thankful for the submission of many quality papers and hope that each author benefited from the submission and review process. While only five very good papers are published in this special section, we hope that all authors benefitted from the process by the exercise of refining their research. The selected papers make a significant contribution to the work and studies conducted by scholars in the area of social commerce. Our special thanks go to Professor Fred Philip, Editor in Chief of Technological Forecasting and Social Change, an international journal and the authors that considered this special issue. Nick Hajli,, Mauricio S. Featherman School of Management, Swansea University, UK Washington State University, USA E-mail address: [email protected]
⁎
Corresponding author.
2