Critical Elements and Lessons Learnt from the Implementation of an RFID-enabled Healthcare Management System in a Medical Organization

Healthcare services are complex and life-critical. One mistake in any procedure may lead to irremediable consequences; numerous researchers, thus, introduce information and communication technology to improve quality of services and enhance patient safety by reducing the medical errors. Radio freque...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of medical systems 2011-08, Vol.35 (4), p.657-669
Main Authors: Ting, S. L., Kwok, S. K., Tsang, Albert H. C., Lee, W. B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Equipment and Supplies
Health care
Health care management
Health Informatics
Health Sciences
Health Services Administration
Humans
Information systems
Maintenance
Medical
Medical equipment
Medical Errors - prevention & control
Medical Records
Medicine
Medicine & Public Health
Organizational Case Studies
Organizations
Original Paper
Patients
Quality of Health Care - organization & administration
Radio frequency identification
Radio Frequency Identification Device - organization & administration
Statistics for Life Sciences
Success factors
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Summary:Healthcare services are complex and life-critical. One mistake in any procedure may lead to irremediable consequences; numerous researchers, thus, introduce information and communication technology to improve quality of services and enhance patient safety by reducing the medical errors. Radio frequency identification (RFID) is considered as one of the emerging tool assist in meeting the challenges of the present situation. In recent years, RFID has been applied in medical organizations for the purpose of managing and tracking medical equipment, monitoring and identifying patients, ensuring that the right medication is given to the right patient, and preventing the use of counterfeit medicine. However, most of the existing literature focuses on demonstrating how RFID can benefit the healthcare industry, whereas little attention has been given to the management issues involved in constructing an RFID project in medical organizations. In this paper, an exploratory case study is conducted in a medical organization to illustrate the development framework and critical issues that should be taken into consideration in the preparation, implementation and maintenance stage of constructing such a project. All the experiences and results discussed in this paper offer valuable and useful insights to steer those who would like to start their journey using RFID in medical organizations.
ISSN:0148-5598
1573-689X
DOI:10.1007/s10916-009-9403-5