گفتمان و سیاست در نظام سلامت آلبرتا: تجزیه و تحلیل سیاست تکنولوژی تلفن همراه Discourse and politics in Alberta’s Health System: An analysis of mobile technology policy

Introduction Technology is changing the way healthcare professionals communicate with other healthcare practitioners and with their patients. Increasingly, healthcare professionals are using mobile health technologies to effectively and efficiently support their health practices. Health information technology (HIT) is broadly defined as the exchange of health information in an electronic environment. A review of articles published from 2000 to the present, from health, technology, and social science databases (CINAHAL, Google Scholar, ProQuest and PubMed/Medline) support widespread adoption of HIT to improve the health of individuals and the performance of healthcare providers [1]. However, regardless of supportive research findings and the ubiquity of mobile devices, healthcare organizations have been slow to adopt and endorse HITs [2]. Though many studies have examined acceptance of HIT in organizations, there is little attention focused on the influence of power and communication and the role these factors play in worker response to technological interventions in practice settings. This paper looks at the political, policy, and communication challenges faced when accepting and adopting mobile technologies in a clinical health setting. Through the lens of French and Raven’s [3] seminal work on power in relationships and Fairhurst and Putnam’s [4] original framework on communication as constitutive of organization, the author illustrates how an agency’s ambiguous mobile device policy, results from organizational power struggles and unclear communication. A historical account of the province’s politics provides background to the policy and a case study of nursing students, instructors and preceptors experience in trying to use mobile phones in the clinical setting as part of the learning process provides real-life context. The aim is to generate greater understanding of the barriers to adoption, acceptance and use of new technologies in a large healthcare system.