article · South African journal of information management
Information and communication technologies offer significant opportunities to improve healthcare delivery, yet public hospitals face practical hurdles when rolling them out. An investigation into public hospitals in Zimbabwe examined the conditions that affect how medical doctors adopt electronic health systems. Drawing on interviews with twenty doctors across randomly selected hospitals, direct observations at five facilities, and reviews of relevant policy documents, the research identified critical internal and external determinants. Internal barriers and enablers include available infrastructure, technological tools, technical support, staff skills, security worries, general facility shortages, and doctor-patient dynamics. Externally, progress is shaped by national health policy, financial resources, and institutional bureaucracy. While digital health remains relatively novel in Zimbabwean public healthcare, addressing these combined factors is vital to unlocking its potential and preventing public hospitals from falling behind.
Digital tools can transform medical access and efficiency, but technological systems often fail without supportive environments. Identifying the specific operational and policy constraints experienced by doctors ensures that future digital health strategies address real hospital conditions. This understanding helps policymakers and healthcare leaders target funding and infrastructure where they are most needed to improve public healthcare services.
The findings inform potential deployments of digital healthcare platforms, electronic health records, and telemedicine infrastructure tailored for public hospital environments. Prospective users include hospital administrators, public health authorities, and medical practitioners. Because the abstract reports early qualitative research into barriers rather than a tested product or intervention, the work is at an exploratory stage, highlighting necessary structural prerequisites before commercial or scaled technical solutions can succeed.
AI-generated from the published abstract. Always read the original work before citing.
Background: Improving access to health care services in both developed and developing countries through information communication technology (ICT) has been getting particular attention from government, medical researchers and practitioners. This has seen many governments proposing the implementation of healthcare systems that are centred on technology, while researchers and practitioners have been arguing for policies that promote the use of technology in healthcare provision. Objective: The main objective of this study was to determine the factors influencing implementation of e-health by medical doctors in public hospitals in Zimbabwe. Methods: The study was guided by a qualitative research in conjunction with multiple-case studies. Qualitative data were collected using 20 semi-structured interviews from selected hospitals concerning the implementation of e-health by medical doctors in public hospitals. Hospitals were selected using random sampling, while purposive sampling was used to select the 20 doctors. In addition, the researcher conducted direct observations at five hospitals. Furthermore, data concerning policy issues in Zimbabwe’s e-health were collected using document review process. Data from the interviews were analysed using data-driven thematic coding. This solo approach was conducted because the researcher intended to reveal e-health influencing factors that could not be revealed by related literature. Results: This study reveals that the implementation of e-health by medical doctors in public hospitals in Zimbabwe is influenced by both internal and external factors. Internal factors include ICT infrastructure and e-health technologies, ICT skills and knowledge, technical support, security concerns, lack of basic medical facilities, demographic factors such as age and doctor–patient relationship. External factors are health policy, funding and bureaucracy. Conclusion: The idea of e-health is relatively new to healthcare centres in Zimbabwe. Its application has not been sufficiently addressed. The study shows that the success of an e-health system depends on internal and external factors. There is a great potential for implementing e-health in Zimbabwe if these factors are taken into consideration. Otherwise, Zimbabwe will continue to lag behind in the implementation of e-health systems in public hospitals.
This page summarises published work. The authoritative version sits with the publisher.
DOI: 10.4102/sajim.v20i1.928
Is something wrong with this record? Report it or request removal.
Discussion
Have you built on this work, tried to replicate it, or seen it applied in practice? Share what you know. Verified researchers and MARATTO™ domain experts can open a discussion, and any member can reply. Contributions are reviewed before they appear.
No discussion yet. Open the first thread.
New to MARATTO™? Create a free account.
