"Healthcare providers no longer consider IT solutions and services an unnecessary cost burden, but a critical value provider," says Frost & Sullivan consultant Dr. Pawel Suwinski. "In public and private hospitals, IT budgets are expected to increase from the year 2009 to 2011."
Spiraling healthcare costs, demand for better quality of healthcare, and rising labour shortage are some of the challenges faced by healthcare delivery organizations. Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and IT managers of hospitals realize that investments in healthcare IT solutions will lower medical errors and costs in the longterm. These factors are driving increased IT spending by healthcare providers.
On the other hand, public and private hospital CIOs' and IT managers' strategic IT investment plans are likely to be hampered by budget constraints and integration issues in the near future.
"Lack of industry standards in countries such as India and China is a major hindrance to the adoption of healthcare IT solutions," explains Dr. Suwinski. "It is important to have the appropriate standards for ease of information flow in the healthcare environment."
The future trend concerning healthcare IT adoption varies from country to country. For instance, in India, the focus is on replacing legacy systems. In Australia and Southeast Asia, hospitals have the basic administrative solutions in place and are now concentrating on adoption of clinical information systems and electronic medical records.
