An exploratory study of user resistance in healthcare IT

Abstract

Abstract:The US healthcare system is clearly experiencing a major transition. By 2015, the healthcare sector is expected to have migrated from a paper record system to a completely electronic health record (EHR) system. The adoption and use of these systems are expected to increase legibility, reduce costs, limit medical errors and improve the overall quality of healthcare. Hence, the US government is investing $70 billion over a 10-year period to facilitate the transition to an electronic system. However, early reports show that physicians and nurses among other health professionals continue to resist the full use of the system. This paper uses the theory of cognitive dissonance to investigate user resistance in HIT. It builds on a Lapointe and Rivard (2005) framework to offer an explanation as to why people resist HITs. A conceptual model is developed and tested. The findings, implications, and limitations of the study are also discussed.

Physicians’ and Nurses’ Perceived Threats Toward Health Information Technology: A Military Hospital Case Study

“…User resistance has been the subject of much research, and in recent years IS researchers have developed various theoretical models that offer new insights and improve our understanding of user resistance. A number of these theoretical models consider the role of user perception to a new system implementation as the leading factor in user resistance, such as the role of perceived threat [7,8,15,16], perceived compatibility [7,17], perceived ease of use [7,9,17], and perceived dissatisfaction [4]. These theoretical models explain that users who believe that the system will negatively impact them, their work, or their status within the organisation will resist the new system [17,15,4].…”

“…A number of these theoretical models consider the role of user perception to a new system implementation as the leading factor in user resistance, such as the role of perceived threat [7,8,15,16], perceived compatibility [7,17], perceived ease of use [7,9,17], and perceived dissatisfaction [4]. These theoretical models explain that users who believe that the system will negatively impact them, their work, or their status within the organisation will resist the new system [17,15,4]. However, few of the user resistance model explained how user perception is developed and how it affects user resistance.…”

“…However, even with the recognised benefits of HIT, the technology is still facing user resistance [2] There are a number of examples of failed HIT implementation because of user resistance (c.f. [3,4]). Furthermore, various studies have shown that user resistance is a contributor to time and budget overruns [5].…”

“…User resistance literature indicates that resistance to HIT is predicated on users' negative perception of the technology [7,8,4,6]. However, very few studies have examined and explained how user perception is formed (e.g.…”

Switching to Electronic Health Record Systems: A Replication of the User Resistance Model

“…We argue that while this perspective is helpful, it does not fully explain why individuals do not want to change to the new ways of working with EHR systems. A few studies that have tried to capture behaviors such as resistance to EHR systems are mostly either conceptual (Boonstra and Broekhusi, 2010;Najaftorkaman et al, 2015;Vishwanath and Scamurra, 2007) or qualitative (Angst and Agarwal, 2009;Ngafeeson and Midha, 2014;Reardon and Davidson, 2007). As a result, there is an evident lack of empirically tested models that explain healthcare providers' resistance to EHR systems (Boonstra and Broekhuis, 2010;Weeger et al, 2011;Olaniran, 2015, Samhan andJoshi, 2015).…”