Information Technology in Health Care

Clinical information technologies -- such as electronic medical records (EMR) computerized physician order-entry (CPOE) systems -- hold enormous promise for reining in the spiralling costs of health care and for improving the quality of care by reducing errors due to inadequate control and imprecise information. While costs of such technologies are relatively easy to estimate, benefits are less tangible and more unpredictable. Working with the UC Davis Medical Center, which is investing about $250 million on clinical information technologies over several years, we are studying questions such as

• What is the impact of these IT investments in health care?
  
  
• What factors lead to successful use of IT in health care, and what
  factors unique to health care are critical to successful IT
  investments?
  
  
• What emerging information technologies (e.g., RFid tags) are
  potentially useful additions to the clinical information technology
  portfolio?
  

Our research team, which includes researchers and staff from the UC Davis Medical Center, welcomes participation by other researchers interested in this topic. We are also interested in research funding by organizations and agencies interested in answers to above questions.