A STUDY ON THE USE OF CLINICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS: THE CASE OF DENIZLI AND ISPARTA

Yıl 2013, Cilt: 13 Sayı: 25, 301 - 328, 01.06.2013

Nuri Ömürbek Mükrime Öksüz Demirgubuz M. Zihni Tunca

Öz

Nowadays, technology has been widely used thanks to ever-increasing innovations.
Healthcare is one of the industries using the new technologies. In recent years, healthcare
industry has faced a significant transformation process. The use of new technologies in
healthcare, increasing population and lifespan, and increasing awareness of consumers
also increase the quality and the quantity of the demand for healthcare services.
Healthcare services aim to protect individuals’ and societies’ health, treat patients,
rehabilitate them and improve quality of the healthy life of the society as a result.
Although the functions of hospitals vary depending on their objectives and mission, there
are four major functions: treatment services, protection and healing services, training and
research activities.
Information is the base of technology and for the use of technology. Information
systems are defined as “the structure that consists of humans, computers and information
tools to collect, form and save the data, and to use them for decision making and
transferring.”
As a result of recent technological developments in information systems and
communication technologies, healthcare data can be saved and accessed digitally. Medical
information systems (MIS) are important data resources, so it is the most popular research
area. MIS deal with the information, data of which was collected and formed by the
healthcare organizations. Developments in medical information systems provide fast pace
of innovations in information modeling and diagnostic tools.
MIS provides diagnostics, treatment, training, communication, data collection and
preparation, database management, and medical decision-making services. MIS consist
of necessary hardware, software, approach and procedures that is effectively used for
producing, distributing and using the necessary data of protective and treating medical
services. MIS can be collected under two broad groups, which are Clinical Information
Systems (CIS), and Diagnostic-Treatment Systems (DTS).
CIS collect private information of the patients to provide necessary useful information
about them. DTS, which are web-based systems, however, provide interfaces for
pharmacy, laboratory and radiology systems. Those systems are designed to obtain
necessary data on time to increase the quality and the productivity of clinical services.
CIS also help MDs to investigate the standards of medical services while helping hospital
management to control the employees’ works and behaviors.
CIS consist of several components such as electronic medical records, clinical
decision support systems, nurse information systems, medical monitoring and storage
systems, clinical communication systems, case informatics, virtual reality, telemedicine,
smartcard applications, hospital information systems, standards, and clinical manuals and
maintenance maps.
DTS, however, consist of necessary information and hardware infrastructure for
diagnosing and treating the illness. DTS utilizes recent medical technologies and systems
to treat all kinds of medical problems. DTS consist of laboratory systems and other
necessary applications.
In recent years, developments in healthcare industry significantly increased the use of
information technologies. As a result, cost, quality and productivity have become key
issues in the industry. Such issues lead wide use of CIS in hospitals. This study aims to investigate the level of medical information system use in Isparta
and Denizli cities. It also aims to examine the aim of MIS usage and its problems in the
regions.
While Denizli is a well-known industrial city, Isparta is famous with a variety of
hospitals. Another difference between Denizli and Isparta is the level of development.
While Denizli is a developed city, Isparta is a developing city. The number of hospitals is
increasing in both cities. The number of hospitals is approcimately the same in both cities.
In this context, this study examines the usage level of CIS in both cities.
The sample of the research is the hospitals in Isparta and Denizli cities. Ten of Isparta
hospitals and 15 of Denizli hospitals have been included in the research. A questionnaire
has been manually distributed to the participants. As some of the participants have not
returned the questionnaires, the response rate 72 per cent is.
Average use of information technologies is eight years in participant hospitals. Ten of
the participants (55.5%) are private hospitals. The number of private and public hospitals
is almost the same in Isparta. Nevertheless, there are more private hospitals in Denizli.
Possible reason of this difference can be started as the preference of the patients. The
patients in Denizli, more industrialized then Isparta, profer more expensive private
hospitals.
Majority of he participants prefer purchasing third-party information technologies.
The participants are also satisfied with the Return-on-Investment of the MIS that they use.
Although most of the participants use online reservation systems, approximately
45.5% of the hospitals are satisfied with the system. Two major reasons of this
dissatisfaction are absence of the patients who prefer online reservations and unethically
abuse of the system by competitors to fill all available reservations using fake patient
names to mislead possible customers.
The participants in both Isparta and Denizli state that they use electronic patience
record system, nurse information system, electronic medical records, clinical information
systems, and hospital information systems. Participants in both cities, however, do not
widely use telemedicine, case informatics, virtual reality, and smartcard applications.
Medical monitoring and storage systems are widely used in the hospitals of Denizli
but not in in Isparta. Smartcard applications also only used in some of the hospitals of
Denizli. In general, although both cities are now using more CIS, the findings suggest that
Denizli use such technologies more effectively.
It is important to support CIS usage for the productivity of healthcare industry. Wider
usage of CIS will not only help providing better patient services, it will also help doctors
and other medical personnel. For that reason, it is important for hospitals to learn and
adopt such systems. However, the findings of this study highlight that there is a lack of
personnel, who can use such systems professionally. Some participants assert that they
need technical personnel, who can deploy and effectively use those systems. The main
reason of this key issue is the misbelief that the higher initial investment cost can be paid
by the systems itself in short term and higher revenues can be obtained in near future.
Participants believe that technology can always return the investment cost in short term.
Hospitals need to have more resources to deploy such systems. In order to diagnose and
treat the patients’ illnesses, it is necessary to make investment on those systems.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Clinical Information Systems, Hospitals, Information Systems, Health Information Systems

HASTANELERDEKİ BİLİŞİM SİSTEMLERİNDEN KLİNİK BİLGİ SİSTEMLERİNİN KULLANIMINA YÖNELİK BİR ARAŞTIRMA: DENİZLİ VE ISPARTA ÖRNEĞİ

Öz

Gelişen dünyada bilgi kavramının öneminin giderek artması ve yaşanan teknolojik gelişmelerle birlikte sağlık sektöründe bilgi teknolojilerinin kullanımı giderek artmaktadır. Dünyamızda bilgi teknolojileri alanında yaşanan hızlı gelişmeler dolayısıyla sağlık bakanlığı sağlık alanında çeşitli sistemleri uygulamaya koymaya çalışmaktadır. Bu alanda yapılan çalışmalardan biri klinik bilgi sistemleri adı altında oluşturulan bazı bilgi sistemleridir. Bu sistemler hastanelerde doktorların ve diğer çalışanların işlerini kolaylaştırmak ve hastalara daha iyi ve hızlı bir şekilde hizmet sunulmasını sağlamaktadır. Bu çalışmada Isparta ve Denizli illerinde araştırmaya katılan hastaneler hakkında genel bilgilerin yanında sağlık sektöründe kullanılan klinik bilgi sistemlerinin son üç yılda kullanım düzeyinde meydana gelen değişiklikler, klinik bilgi sistemlerini kullanma amaçları ve bu amaçlara ulaşma düzeyleri, hastanelerin klinik bilgi sistemlerini kullanmada karşılaştıkları sorunların tespitine yönelik bir saha araştırması yapılmıştır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Klinik Bilgi Sistemleri, Hastane, Bilgi Sitemleri, Sağlık Bilişim Sistemleri