Utilizing Health Information Technology to Support Universal Healthcare Delivery: Experience of a National Healthcare System.
Recent discussions have focused on using health information technology (HIT) to support goals related to universal healthcare delivery. These discussions have generally not reflected on the experience of countries with a large amount of experience using HIT to support universal healthcare on a national level. HIT was compared globally by using data from the Ministry of the Interior, Republic of China (Taiwan). Taiwan has been providing universal healthcare since 1995 and began to strategically implement HIT on a national level at that time. Today the national-level HIT system is more extensive in Taiwan than in many other countries and is used to aid administration, clinical care, and public health. The experience of Taiwan thus can provide an illustration of how HIT can be used to support universal healthcare delivery. In this article we present an overview of some key historical developments and successes in the adoption of HIT in Taiwan over a 17-year period, as well as some more recent developments. We use this experience to offer some strategic perspectives on how it can aid in the adoption of large-scale HIT systems and on how HIT can be used to support universal healthcare delivery.
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .
Shabbir
S
Syed-Abdul
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .|2 Bureau of International Cooperation, Ministry of Health and Welfare , Taipei, Taiwan .
Min-Huei
MH
Hsu
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .
Usman
U
Iqbal
3 Health Informatics Centre, Karolinska Institutet , Stockholm, Sweden .
Jeremiah
J
Scholl
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .
Chih-Wei
CW
Huang
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .
Phung Anh
PA
Nguyen
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .
Peisan
P
Lee
4 Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Maria Teresa
MT
García-Romero
1 Graduate Institute of Biomedical Informatics, College of Medical Science and Technology, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .|5 Department of Dermatology, Wan Fang Hospital , Taipei, Taiwan .
Yu-Chuan Jack
YC
Li
6 School of Health Care Administration, Taipei Medical University , Taipei, Taiwan .|7 Faculty of Health Sciences, Macau University of Science and Technology , Macau .
Wen-Shan
WS
Jian
D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D008490:Medical Informatics / Q000639:trends*; D013624:Taiwan; D019472:Universal Health Insurance
advance technologies; health informatics; health information technology; health policy; medical informatics; universal health