Application of TOPSIS method for evaluation of IT application in the hospital

Abstract

The article covers the issue of evaluation of IT application in a hospital. Various IT solutions support the process of carrying out virtually all hospital processes, including medical, logistics and management. They are all linked together, forming a Hospital Information System (HIS). Making decisions concerning its improvement and expansion requires an evaluation of its elements, as well as an assessment of the extent to which they satisfy user requirements, supporting the processes carried out. This type of evaluation can be carried out by commissioning an external audit. However, the nature of a hospital supports using the knowledge of HIS users, which needs to be acquired and processed. The objective of the article is to present the way user knowledge is processed in a synthetic assessment of the impact of IT applications on the quality and effectiveness of processes they support. Aggregation of knowledge obtained from questionnaire responses was carried out using the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS), which is one of the most widely used techniques of multi-criteria decision-making. This technique is based on the assumption that the selected alternative should have the least distance to the positive ideal and the most distance to the negative ideal. However, for the purposes of this article TOPSIS was used in less typical way. The suggested approach to the evaluation of HIS elements is shown in detail on the basis of an IT application supporting administrative processes in a hospital. Knowledge about its functioning was collected from its users on the basis of a questionnaire, which encompassed 45 questions in total, covering 12 evaluation criteria. The responses were aggregated using TOPSIS for two indicators: impact of IT applications on the quality (1) and effectiveness (2) of the process. The resulting numerical value represents the distance between the evaluated application and the hypothetical best and worst solution. Placing the values of the evaluation indicators in the suggested matrix identifies HIS elements which require urgent changes. The method of processing user knowledge presented in the article was developed in connection with the need to develop the HIS at University Clinical Hospital in Opole (UCHiO). This method is, however, labour-intensive and therefore intended to large and complex organisations using many IT applications.