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Expand How We Think About Project Management to Increase HIT Success
The Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) 1999 publication, To Err is Human, reported that 44 to 99 thousand people die annually due to preventable medical errors costing between $17 and $29 billion yearly. Healthcare is currently in a quality, safety and cost crisis. One IOM recommendation included using HIT to help end this crisis.
The New England Journal of Medicine’s (NEJM) July 3, 2008 article, Electronic Health Records in Ambulatory Care — A National Survey of Physicians, indicated that only 4% of physicians report having extensive, fully functional Electronic Health Records (EHR) systems. Meanwhile, Forrestor Research’s April 23, 2009 article, Technology Marketing In The Challenging 2008 Economy, stated that HIT spending will reach $35 billion by 2011. We are investing heavily in HIT to help solve the healthcare crisis, but HIT adoption rates are very low. Instead of contributing to the solution, HIT is now part of the problem. One way to fix the HIT problem is to expanded how we think about project management. We need to include technology and change management in project management. Project management currently includes the processes for completing a project. To help HIT project success, it should also include:- Technology Management – What the project produces, i.e., the hard skills that are tangible and so much easier to address when compared to soft skills, and
- Change Management – How people transition from a current to a future state, i.e., the soft skills that are generally intangible.
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