Comparison of Greek and Portuguese Hospital Websites Using HSWAI v1.1

Abstract

Every country should aim to strengthen the efficiency, accessibility and quality of its health system. To achieve this goal, the digital transformation of hospitals, which are the main pillars of any health system, is necessary. Patients and potential users of health services use the websites of healthcare institutions to find and access information about their health problems in health services. Greece has two hundred and forty-five(245) public and private hospi- tals. Using the HSWAI tool of the United Nations Universi- ty in Portugal – Operating Unit on Policy Driven Electronic Governance, the websites of the aforementioned hospitals were evaluated. The results of the evaluation were used to compare with the corresponding results in a survey con- ducted in Portugal with the same tool. The current paper deals with the comparison of the overall values according to HSWAI between the hospitals of Greece and Portugal as countries with a European character and both with a simi- lar profile (population, economy, health spending etc). Specifically, comparison was made of overall HSWAI values of Greek and Portuguese hospitals. Also, a comparison was carried out of HSWAI values of Greek and Portuguese hos- pitals in the four Criterions of the tool such as “Content”, «Services», «Community Interaction» and «Technology Features». From the comparison came up that in three cri- teria Portuguese hospitals have better performance and Greek hospitals are ahead only in Criterion «Technology Features». In conclusion, Portuguese hospitals have more complete, better quality and more interactive websites than Greek ones.