Health Information Technology Adoption: Effects on Quality of Care and Patient Safety in Us Acute Care Hospitals

Previous studies show that the healthcare industry lags behind many other economic sectors in the adoption of information technology. The purpose of this book is to understand differences in structural characteristics between healthcare providers that do and that do not adopt HIT. The new contribution of the present study lies in the fact that it uses nationally representative latest available data and it incorporates a large number of technologies. Large size and urban location were found to be the most influential hospital characteristics that positively affect information technology adoption. Hospital ownership was not associated with technology adoption. The findings also indicate that a significant number of hospitals are still reluctant to use clinical HIT. Thus, even though the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 was a good stimulus, a more aggressive policy intervention from the government is warranted in order to direct the healthcare industry towards a better adoption of clinical HIT.