Executive Summary
Increasing patient safety/reducing medical errors is among the top business issues that will most impact healthcare in the next two years, according to healthcare IT executives who participated in the 16th Annual HIMSS Leadership Survey. Focus on this issue is further demonstrated by participant responses regarding their current/future top IT priorities and the importance of IT applications. When asked to identify their organization’s top IT priorities, both today and in the next two years, implementing technology to reduce medical errors/promote patient safety topped the list of current priorities and was second only to implementing an electronic medical records (EMRs) system among future priorities. In addition to citing the implementation of an EMR as a top future priority, respondents also identified it as the IT application that would be most important to their organization in the next two years. Respondents are also likely to identify clinical applications as important. Bar coded medication management technology, clinical information systems and computerized provider order entry (CPOE) software were all identified by at least half of survey respondents as important future applications for their healthcare organization. All of these applications can have a significant impact on improving patient safety and reducing medical errors.
Other key survey findings and comparisons to 2004 results include:
Financial support: Financial support for IT continues to be an issue for healthcare IT executives. Twenty percent of respondents cited lack of adequate financial support as the most significant barrier to successfully implementing IT at their organization.
Security concerns: An internal breach of security continues to be the primary security concern identified by healthcare IT executives and the majority of organizations use multiple technologies to secure their data. Seventy percent of respondents indicated they plan to implement single sign-on in the next two years. Only 21 percent of respondent facilities are currently using this security tool.
Top technologies: High-speed networks, the Intranet, wireless information systems and client server systems continue to be the technologies that are most frequently cited as currently being in use at respondent’s facilities.
Technology adoption: Nearly 60 percent of respondents cited personal digital assistants (PDAs), bar coding technology and speech recognition as technologies their facility plans to implement in the next two years. While only 18 percent of respondents report a fully operational EMR is in place at their organization, nearly two-thirds indicated they have either developed a plan to implement an EMR system or they have begun to install EMR hardware and software.
Web site use: A majority of respondents (76 percent) indicate their facility plans to add patient scheduling to their Web site in the next two years. Only 16 percent of respondents indicate that this functionality is currently available on their organization’s Web site.
IT budgets: Three-quarters of respondents reported that their IT budgets will increase in the next year. Most of the increases should be substantial, with 56 percent reporting a projected increase of at least six percent.
IT staffing: While nearly two-thirds of respondents indicate that the number of FTEs in their IT department will increase in the next 12 months, the change will be small. Sixty-two percent of respondents indicated that their staff would increase by less than 10 percent.
IT outsourcing: Nearly three-quarters of respondents’ facilities currently outsource one or more IT functions. The use of outsourcing over the next two years is not expected to decrease.
Vendor satisfaction: In general, respondents were satisfied with the IT products/services they receive from suppliers, application vendors and consulting firms—69 percent of respondents indicated that they were either satisfied or very satisfied.