Survey on Doctors and Nurses
The research paper “The Impact of Technology on Health Sectors in the UAE” describes the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), which deals with health care. It is known as e-health. WHO describes e-health as secure and efficient use of ICT in health related sections such as health education, health literature and surveillance of health research (WHO, 2005). The paper discusses in what way ICT implementation was successful in various parts of the world, particularly in the UAE.
Several projects showed progress like reduced mortality rate by 25-50% and enhancement in terms of productivity in the health care system of United Arab Emirates (Greenberg, 2005). The quality of care for patients is experiencing massive improvements. These improvements can be mainly attributed to the recent progress in the field of IT. The medical history of an individual can be held by diital records (electronic medical record – EMR). According to Ajeet (2003), a health care expert, the benefits that the EMR brings into the health care will only be realized when the necessary channels for information distribution in an integrated health care network are established.
It is of utmost importance that organizations establish connections between information and the access of that information.ICT can be used for a variety of technologies for analysis, storage, data collection and recovery, which requires training of the workforce in the required health information skills (Berland et al, 2001). There is a problem of computer illiteracy among the vast population of doctors, nurses and health care workers (Mohamed-Nour, 2005, p.21). This brings about the problem of resentment from the doctors as well as additional requirements for capital necessary to train them. The issue of training also raises another issue in the sense that the doctorrs will have to take some time off to attend the training, which may lead to the neglect of their patients.
Moreover, there is also an issue of personal barriers as some doctors and nurses prefer to use their personal experience rather than consult with another person (WHO, 2006). In addition, the use of the IT systems may reduce the amount of interaction between a doctor and his patients, thereby interrupting the traditional doctor patient relationship, which has some sentimental value as face to face communication gives hope to patients The systems also add to the doctors’ workload, especially in the initial stages of implementation.The following recommendation was given in the paper regarding medical personnel: it is necessary to involve physicians in the development of information technologies including them at an inception of the project and consistently asking physician’s advice and feedback.
