This research focuses on the impact of Information Technology (IT) and the corresponding outcomes during an intense period of change and restructuring of the Singapore General Hospital (SGH), the premier public hospital in Singapore. / The primary aim of the Singapore Government in restructuring hospitals was to control costs because of limited resources. Singapore is a small city-state and devoid of any natural resources like gas, oil or minerals and her only resource is a population of four million people. The Singapore Government allocates 3% of GDP for health-care and increasing costs coupled with an ageing population and the growing demand from the public for better health-care services have made it difficult to increase health-care funds indefinitely. Hence, to control rising costs, the question was whether Information Technology could help, apart from other areas of management, viz. pruning staff, reducing costs, etc. At the time of restructuring SGH, management looked at how IT could play an integral role in cutting costs, streamlining processes and improving overall efficiency and effectiveness. Ultimately, the aim was to achieve the Holy Grail of having a fully integrated campus-wide electronic medical record (EMR). However, prior to developing an EMR, there was a multitude of other areas that IT could be harnessed for greater efficiency and the challenge was to use IT to tie the business side and the medical side of running a large public hospital. IT staff had to develop user-friendly software adapted to the needs of end-users as the aim was to provide the best patient care outcomes. The business side consisted of tasks of varying complexities, viz. updated billings for hospital charges, regular updates of the large inventory of medical consumables and hospital supplies with data available at any point in time to avoid keeping excessive stocks beyond expiry and ordering sufficient stocks to meet seasonal demands, and monthly updates of bed occupancy, OT utilisation, ward and clinic resources, etc. / On the medical side, IT was used to integrate various laboratories, wards and satellite pharmacies to cut down on time-consuming voluminous paperwork as well as to assist staff to code, tag and deliver correct food trolleys to various impatient wards, conduct regular medical audits and quality control of hospital operations to improve efficiency and identify outliers in respect of ineffective OT utilisation. IT was also used to establish resources for one-stop medical centres so patients would not have to go from pillar to post to receive treatment as well as develop a fully integrated EMR with the patients full medical records, i.e. previous drugs taken, dosage prescribed, history of drug allergies, etc. The data could be collated, mined and stored to find new treatment modalities for better patient outcomes. / This thesis is confined to information technology (IT) and excludes medical technology, as IT was instrumental in bringing about many of the progressive developments at SGH from the time of restructuring till to-date, IT transcended through clinical and non-clinical departments throughout the hospital to facilitate improvements in hospital operations whereas medical technology was restricted to medical specialists who had a specific interest to acquire and use medical techniques, knowledge or equipment associated with the technology. / Public hospitals have an imperative need to utilise the enormous capacity of IT to enhance and improve operational performance by sorting and sifting information effectively and efficiently, viz. medical records, financial statistics, etc. The significance of the research findings would be instructive to comparable complex public hospitals who are challenged to tap into the important potential of IT to maintain, sustain or boost their organisational capabilities and hence impuove their competitiveness to remain viable in the health-care industry. A total of 100 questionnaires were sent out to various categories of staff and 10 face-to-face interviews were conducted to obtain first-hand accounts of complex and routine issues that direct users of IT had to grapple with, during the period of hospital restructuring. The important findings are set out in detail in the data analysis as well as in the conclusion to explicitly illustrate the contributions of this research thesis. / The findings illuminate the ways in which IT impacted upon the daily work of a large and complex public hospital. Detailed analysis of the process of change, in which IT is a constantly evolving form of innovation, throws light on the slow way in which hospital staff gradually became attuned to the potential of the tools of technology to enhance their work performance and productivity. This research material is especially useful to hospital adminstrators who have the responsibility to craft workable policies and practical guidelines for incorporating IT into organisational operations. The research, therefore, contributes to policy making in regard to the administrative operations of a large public sector hospital. This thesis is submitted as a new and original contribution in the context of a large public sector hospital in a developed country. / Thesis (PhDBusinessandManagement)--University of South Australia, 2005.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/267289 |
| Creators | Wee, May Li Stella. |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | copyright under review |
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