Title:	FROM “PATIENT-CENTRIC” TO “CITIZEN-CENTRIC”: REVIEW OF THE TERM USAGE THROUGH E-HEALTH EVOLUTION
Author(s):	Yong Han
ISBN:	978-972-8939-31-1
Editors:	Piet Kommers, Tomayess Issa and Pedro Isaías
Year:	2010
Edition:	Single
Keywords:	E-health, Hospital information systems, Health information systems, Patient-centric, Citizen-centric
Type:	Full Paper
First Page:	214
Last Page:	220
Language:	English
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Full Contents:	click to dowload
Paper Abstract:	Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to clarify what would be the proper term for describing e-health service receivers, in the environment of rapidly evolving e-health technologies. It also discusses the emerging new ecosystem of e-health. Approach – The paper conducted an overall review of the evolution of system development focus and the term usage through each phase of e-health since 1970s. Based on the review of literature, the paper argues that the term of “patients” or “patients and consumers” are not anymore appropriate enough to include all the current e-health receivers. Findings – By promoting e-health, the scope of healthcare services crosses the borders of hospital information systems. The services of wellbeing promotion and disease care are considered an integrated process through citizens’ life. People are empowered to manage their own health with or without the support of the healthcare professionals. Therefore, the term of “citizen” is proposed to be the best term in the context of e-health. Correspondingly, the development of e-health is essentially promoting citizen-centric healthcare services in parallel. Many new web-based, mobile or telehealth solutions are emerging for citizens’ use. They differ from those systems used by professional health workers and form a new ecosystem of their own: the emerging citizen-centric ecosystem, which has three main attributes: citizen owns his/her information, citizen is the active health information provider and citizen participates in determining the process of the healthcare. Contributions – The paper helps to understand the new trend of e-health development and the emerging e-health ecosystems. How to improve the communication and integration between citizen-centric ecosystem and service provider ecosystem deserves further study.
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