IT Infrastructure Capability and Health Information Exchange: The Moderating Role of Electronic Medical Records’ Reach

Abstract

This research investigates the hypothesized relationship between a hospital’s IT infrastructure capability and the degree to which hospital can exchange health information. Enhanced information exchange within and between hospitals is currently considered to be critical for modern hospital operations in the big data era. In this research, we build on the resource-based view of the firm to position the deployment and usage of IT capabilities as a unique, valuable, appropriable and difficult-to-imitate resource of value for hospitals. Following the resource-based view of the firm, this study argues IT is a strategic source of value for hospitals. Guided by our research model we test two related hypotheses using Partial least squares (PLS)-based Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) on a large-scale cross-sectional dataset of 1155 European hospitals. Results show that IT infrastructure capability is a crucial antecedent of health information exchange. Finally, we found that the degree to which hospitals deploy hospital-wide systems that electronically maintain and share health data and information, i.e., Electronic Medical Records, influences the strength of this particular relationship. These particular findings suggest that although IT investments in hospitals continue to grow, IT plans and strategies to enable health information exchange will require ongoing attention. Hence, our research provides valuable insights into how IT can be targetted and exploited to support capabilities in clinical practice. Specifically, we demonstrate the conditions under which hospitals can leverage their IT resources to enhance levels of patient and health information exchange within the hospital and beyond its boundaries.