Empowering patients and professionals: case of Lithuanian e-health system

Abstract

New technologies change our social-economic everyday life by making considerable impact on its quality. The healthcare in the meantime is becoming more and more dependent on information and communication technologies, which enable the development of high quality healthcare services. The deployment of new ICTs has the potential to increase organisational efficiency of healthcare providers, change the processes of work organisation and create the conditions for electronic patient information exchange between healthcare providers according to the nationally agreed standards. The main idea of the paper is a proposition that the engagement of various stakeholder groups into the process of e-Health development has the potential to pave a more effective way of introducing innovation in healthcare sector and contribute to the greater sustainability of achieved changes. Quantitative research explored the extent and trends of the engagement and participation of stakeholder groups in the process of e-Health development in Lithuania.