39% of the senior professionals consider the top healthcare delivery priority to be the development of a regional or national electronic health record, according to a recent HIMSS survey, due to be published today at the conference.
The survey drew its conclusions from the answers of 192 healthcare executives interviewed between 10 August and 1 October 2007.
Moreover, 36% of the respondents support the strengthening of ITC connections to cover all the environments where physicians are necessarily operative.
What's more, just 29% of the executives think that improving technology to reduce medical errors should be a priority, and spreading clinical knowledge to users is considered relevant by only 27% of those participating in the survey.
Regarding business issues in the healthcare sector, the executives' main recommendation is improving the quality of care (49%), with patient satisfaction considered a business priority by 43% of the sample and the adoption of new technology relevant for 37%.
The most important healthcare ICT application is considered to be the clinical data repository, followed by clinical information systems.
Meanwhile, the survey identified the lack of strategic ICT plans as the biggest barrier to the implementation of ICT in the healthcare sector.
A clear majority of the sample expect an increase in both budget and staff for the healthcare sector in the years to come. 62% believe the operating budget will increase in 2008, while 25% think there will be no change. Only 5% say that the budget will decrease. 65% envisage an increase staff numbers in 2007. 30% consider this increase will be between 2% and 9% compared to current levels.
Among the innovative projects discussed during the conference is EuResist, a Commission-funded initiative to facilitate the identification of the best therapies for HIV patients through the use of a huge, European integrated data set.
