HIT Diffusion Patterns by Hospitals

This study, positioned at the macro level, draws upon research in the adoption and diffusion of technology to examine factors influencing Health Information Technology (HIT) diffusion in hospitals. The study focuses on a range of HIT applications that have clinical, administrative and strategic functions. I theorized that the HIT adoption is driven by the combination of technological, organizational, financial, and environmental factors. The study results indicate that adoption of HIT has accelerated in the last few years and HIT adoption in its’ current form is not necessarily driven by organizational, financial or environmental characteristics of a given hospital. With the passage of time, the importance of hospital characteristics in terms of HIT adoption is diminishing; particularly for the long-existing HIT applications. More and more hospitals are adopting a growing number of various HIT applications and we might have reached a juncture where the adoption and diffusion of HIT applications in its’ current form is just a matter of time for all hospitals.