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Unintended Consequences of Information Technologies in Health Care—An Interactive Sociotechnical Analysis

Item

Title
Unintended Consequences of Information Technologies in Health Care—An Interactive Sociotechnical Analysis
Abstract/Description
Many unintended and undesired consequences of Healthcare Information Technologies (HIT) flow from interactions between the HIT and the healthcare organization's sociotechnical system—its workflows, culture, social interactions, and technologies. This paper develops and illustrates a conceptual model of these processes that we call Interactive Sociotechnical Analysis (ISTA). ISTA captures common types of interaction with special emphasis on recursive processes, i.e., feedback loops that alter the newly introduced HIT and promote second-level changes in the social system. ISTA draws on prior studies of unintended consequences, along with research in sociotechnical systems, ergonomics, social informatics, technology-in-practice, and social construction of technology. We present five types of sociotechnical interaction and illustrate each with cases from published research. The ISTA model should further research on emergent and recursive processes in HIT implementation and their unintended consequences. Familiarity with the model can also foster practitioners' awareness of unanticipated consequences that only become evident during HIT implementation.
Date
2007
In publication
Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association
Volume
14
Issue
5
Pages
542-549
Resource type
en
Medium
en Print
Background/context type
en Other
Open access/free-text available
en Yes
Peer reviewed
en Yes
ISSN
1067-5027
Citation
Harrison, M. I., Koppel, R., & Bar-Lev, S. (2007). Unintended Consequences of Information Technologies in Health Care—An Interactive Sociotechnical Analysis. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 14(5), 542–549. https://doi.org/10.1197/jamia.M2384
Abbreviation
Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association

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