Critical Issues in Implementing and Adopting National e-Health Solutions: Lessons from Australia’s MyHealth Record

Abstract

Globally, healthcare reforms are being initiated to address the tremendous challenges facing healthcare systems. Without exception, these reforms include the implementation of a variety of e-health solutions. Such e-health solutions are complex and have far reaching implications. We argue that while these implementations and adoptions of e-health solutions are necessary, it is essential that an appropriate lens of analysis should be used to maximise and sustain the benefits of IS/IT (information systems/information technology) in healthcare delivery. Hence, in this paper, we proffer Actor-Network Theory (ANT) as an appropriate lens to evaluate these various e-health solutions and illustrate in the context of MyHealth Record, the chosen e-health solution for Australia. The results of this study reveal that the implementation of eHealth is a complex process and approaching it nationally, serves to make it significantly more challenging with enormous barriers.