Abstract:
This sequel accompanies the case 1800.0. In January, 1997, the Rhode Island Department of Public Health inaugurated KIDSNET, an effort to harness the power of information technology to ensure that all children in the state received proper preventive care. The medical informatics system was designed to track essential public-health data such as immunizations and make it accessible to the health care providers and public health programs across the state. Informatics, in other words, was to improve child health by making sure that any doctor or emergency room in the state could quickly and conveniently become aware of key aspects of any child's medical history. The system was to be fully operational by the year 2000. The marriage of computer records and public health did not go smoothly, however, and, in late 1999, a consultant found that the system was grossly underutilized. KIDSNET was tracking immunizations for but 43 percent of infants and only 31 percent of the clinics and doctor's offices in Rhode Island were submitting immunization data.
Learning Objective:
The case is designed to support discussion of how information technology systems can best be utilized to improve public sector performance and to examine bureaucratic barriers to implementation--why they arise and how they can be overcome.
