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Annual Review of Economics

Volume 14, 2022

The Impact of Health Information and Communication Technology on Clinical Quality, Productivity, and Workers

Abstract

The adoption of health information and communication technology (HICT) has surged over the past two decades. We survey the medical and economic literature on HICT adoption and its impact on clinical outcomes, productivity, and the health care workforce. We find that HICT improves clinical outcomes and lowers health care costs; however, () the effects are modest so far, () it takes time for these effects to materialize, and () there is much variation in the impact. More evidence on the causal effects of HICT on productivity is needed to improve our analytical understanding and to guide further adoption. There is little econometric work directly investigating the impact of HICT on labor market outcomes, but the existing literature suggests that there are no substantial negative effects on employment and earnings. Overall, although health care is in many ways exceptional, we are struck by the similarities of our conclusions to the wider findingson the relationship between productivity and information and communication technologies, which stress the importance of complementary factors (e.g., management practices and skills) in determining the impact of these new technologies.

Keyword(s): health care, JEL I11, JEL I18, JEL J21, JEL J24, JEL M15, JEL O14, jobs, productivity, technology
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/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-economics-080921-101909
2022-08-12
2024-04-19
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/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-economics-080921-101909
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The Impact of Health Information and Communication Technology on Clinical Quality, Productivity, and Workers
Annual Review of Economics 14, 23 (2022); https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-economics-080921-101909
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-economics-080921-101909
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-economics-080921-101909
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