SKBP 1023

3rd posting – The impact of Using ICT/Wireless Technology in Health

 

Welcome back for my 3^rd posting for this week. This time, I would like to discuss on the Impact of ICT towards Our Health.

It seems that everyone is talking about the Information Society these days. Apparently, society is changing under the influence of rapidly evolving Information and Communication Technologies. ICT for health describes the application of information and communication technologies across the whole range of functions that affect the health sector. Nowadays, it is hard to imagine health care without Information and Communication Technology (ICT). Information technology in health care has existed for about three decades, and has gained widespread usage.

The term ICT refers to technologies as such. Whether the use of these technologies is successful depends not only on the quality of the technological artifacts but also on the actors, i.e. the people involved in information processing and the organizational environment in which they are employed. Introduction of ICT can radically affect health care organization and health care delivery and outcome. It is evident that the use of modern ICT offers tremendous opportunities to support health care professionals and to increase the efficiency, effectiveness and appropriateness of care.

Many inventions were created to assist the professionals in the health sector with researching and diagnosing the patient’s health conditions besides in helping them to collect, analyze and modeling data. Breakthroughs in surgery, medicine and treatment often result from scientists’ use of computers. Tiny computers now imitate functions of the central nervous system, retina of the eye, and cochlea of the ear.

For instance, a cochlea implant allows a deaf person to listen. Thus, hearing aids, an electro acoustic body-worn apparatus which typically fits in or behind the wearer’s ear, was designed to amplify and modulate sounds for the hearing-impaired person (people who do not hear some sounds at all). Recent hearing aids include wireless hearing aids. One hearing aid can transmit to the other side so that pressing one aid’s program button simultaneously changes the other aid and both aids change background settings simultaneously.

Apart from that, electrodes implanted in the brain stop tremors associated with Parkinson’s disease. Cameras that are small to swallow – sometimes called a camera pill – take pictures inside the body to detect polyps, cancer and other abnormalities.

Other possible surgeries might implant a rechargeable electrical stimulator to treat pain or muscle dysfunction or to zap the stomach or nerves with electric current to boost metabolism. A brain computer interface may monitor and treat diseases, such as epilepsy and depression that affect brain activity. A body-scanning machine might evaluate patients’ pain when they cannot communicate. In addition, a retinal prosthesis system with a light sensing chip implanted in the eye might help patients with degenerative retinal disease.

However, there can also be hazards of these associated with information technology in health care. ICT can be inappropriately specified, have functional errors, be unreliable, user-unfriendly, ill-functioning or the environment may not be properly prepared to accommodate the ICT in the working processes. Such breakdowns and failures may negatively affect the working processes and decisions of health care providers and may result in harm for the patients, i.e. ICT can create adverse side effects in the care process. Good medical practice implies that one is aware of the possible side effects of one’s actions and that one has insight into the implication of such side effects.

References:

1. http://royalsociety.org/publication.asp?id=5996

2. www.wikipedia.com

3. www.sciencedirect.com

4. Cashman, Thomas J. Discovering Computers 2008 Complete.2008

5. http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/

 

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