Canadian eHealth
I’m sure it shouldn’t really be a suprise that those involved in developing and implementing the electronic aspects of our health care system would not only provide their own resistance to the movement, but would also find the general population to be leery of having their most-private and personal information being available nation-wide. The problem or perception of the situation is of course only made worse when there is no clear-cut solution or well-known/respected company to provide that solution. And, of course, anyone breathing is aware that this is just another of the growing issues that our health care system faces. I don’t blame any of the parties mentioned or suggested here, but take a second to read the following:
“The real challenge in health care is cultural,” said Ross Armstrong, senior research analyst at London, Ont.-based Info-Tech. Persuading doctors to invest thousands of dollars of their own money in a system that will benefit the health care system as a whole and change the way they work is a huge challenge.
To encourage doctor buy-in, vendors, he said, need to better craft their messages to show doctors how digitizing their offices will give them more time to dedicate to the most profitable parts of their practice.
Now, I’m not one to tell a doctor how to do their job, at least not to their face, but hasn’t it been apparent since sometime around the 80’s that the industry would have to make this leap? And who else would have to put up the money for this?! Not that we’re necessarily in the dark ages, but we’re a ways back of other systems, where customers are starting to be able to access their personal health records via their mobile phone.