Information Technology in Healthcare

Now in its 26th year, the Information Technology in Healthcare track at HICSS continues to evolve and expand while staying true to our founding mission: To serve as a forum at which healthcare, computer science, and information systems professionals can come together to discuss issues related to the application of information technology in healthcare.

The cross-disciplinary nature of the track is clearly evident in the set of minitracks and in the papers within the minitracks. This year’s 16 minitracks represent 10 returning from last year and 6 new minitracks, noted with an “*” below.

• Body Sensor Networks for Personalized Medicine*
• Cybercrimes in Healthcare*
• Data Platforms and Ecosystems in Healthcare
• Decision Support of Healthcare Processes and Services
• Digital Innovations for the Aging Society
• Digitally-enabled Blood Testing in Healthcare*
• Health Behavior Change Support Systems
• Healthcare Applications for Personal Vehicles*
• IT Adoption, Diffusion and Evaluation in Healthcare
• Personal Health Management with Digital Solutions
• Process Mining in Healthcare
• Security and Privacy Challenges for Healthcare
• Self-Management of Chronic Diseases and Conditions
• Social Media and Healthcare Technology
• Technology for Measuring and Treating Stress and Trauma*
• Technology, Machine Learning and Bias in Emergency Care*

The minitrack coordinators provide brief summaries of their minitracks and overviews of the papers in their sessions.

As evidenced by the names of the minitracks, the track covers a very diverse set of IT and health management related issues. The largest minitracks continue to be those on decision support, IT adoption and diffusion, and social media. New minitracks bring a greater focus on AI, body sensors, and cybercrimes in healthcare. We received 159 submissions to the track, with 76 accepted papers across the minitracks. Papers address a wide range of clinical, managerial, technical issues, social, and policy issues, and report on studies from around the world. Health issues addressed range from arthritis to trauma surgery, covering a very wide range of disorders and diseases. Technologies investigated range from AI to social networks. Taken as a whole the papers provide insight into the continuing and future impacts of IT on health management and healthcare delivery.

Here is a small sample of the types of papers in this year’s track, which highlights the diversity: On organizational and administrative issues, one paper investigates why hospital acquisitions negatively affect patient outcomes. Another looks at explainable AI and factors influencing medical practitioners trust in collaborative tasks. Two papers cover the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) in very different environments: one to deliver vaccines to remote areas and the other to deliver overdose antidote in urban areas. Many papers cover issues related to social media, from predicting adolescent suicide to classifying vaccine misinformation. AI and machine learning are addressed in a number of settings, including point-of-care ultrasound education and supportive chatbots for blood donors. Finally, many papers investigate the use of wearable devices and cell phones to facilitate positive health behavioral change and self-managed chronic diseases, including diabetes management, HIV, and alcohol abuse.

Despite the diversity of topics and countries represented in this track, all of the papers have a common focus: How can information technologies be used to improve the quality of care, the efficiency of the delivery of healthcare, and improve the overall health and wellness of individuals and populations?

We wish to thank all of the people who have worked so diligently to develop this track, including our many paper reviewers; we appreciate the time and effort of the minitrack coordinators; the high-quality collection of papers in the track is the fruit of their efforts. We look forward to the further development of this track. We welcome, and strongly solicit, your participation in this track at future HICSS conferences. Please contact us with your ideas for new minitracks or papers.

We hope you find the proceedings useful and enjoyable.

William G. Chismar
University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
chismar@hawaii.edu

Rochelle K. Rosen
Brown University
Rochelle_Rosen@Brown.edu