Health information technology is continuously changing and becoming more complex and susceptible to errors. It is both an essential and disruptive innovation that requires proper management of risks arising from its use. To properly manage these risks, there is a need to, first, determine how healthcare organizations in Canada are addressing the issue of errors arising from the use of health information technology (i.e., technology-induced errors). The purpose of this thesis is to determine the level of technology-induced error awareness in Canadian healthcare organizations, to identify processes and procedures at these organizations aimed at addressing, managing, and preventing technology-induced errors, as well as to identify factors that contribute to technology-induced errors. The study finds that, based on the currently available literature, information about these errors in healthcare is not complete. This prevents the development and application of effective health information technology risk management solutions. The research from the semi-structured interviews finds that the definition of technology-induced errors is not consistent among the study participants. The research from the semi-structured interviews also finds a lack of consensus on factors that cause technology-induced errors as well as a lack of reporting mechanisms available that are specifically aimed at reporting technology-induced errors in healthcare. This confirms that there is a lack of technology-induced error awareness among Canadian healthcare organizations, which prevents the ability to properly address, manage, and prevent these errors. / Graduate / 0769 / 0723 / paulebw@uvic.ca

This study demonstrates that hybrid methods can be used for measuring the risk severity of technology-induced errors (TIE) that result from use of health information technology (HIT). The objectives of this research study include: 1. Developing an integrated conceptual risk assessment model to measure the risk severity of technology-induced errors. 2. Analyzing the criticality and risk thresholds associated with TIE’s contributing factors. 3. Developing a computer-based simulation model that could be used to undertake various simulations of TIE’s problems and validate the results. Using data from published papers describing three sample problems related to usability and technology-induced errors, hybrid methods were developed for assessing the risk severity and thresholds under various simulated conditions. A risk assessment model (RAM) and its corresponding steps were developed. A computer-based simulation of risk assessment using the model was also developed, and several runs of the simulation were carried out. The model was tested and found to be valid. Based on assumptions and published statistics obtained by publically available databases, we measured the risk severity and analyzed its criticality to classify risks of contributing factors into four different classes. The simulation results validated the efficiency and efficacy of the proposed methods with the sample problems. / Graduate / 0723 / 0680 / 0769 / tschio2011@gmail.com