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Barriers and Facilitators of eHealth Adoption Among Healthcare Providers in Uganda – A Quantitative Study

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e-Infrastructure and e-Services for Developing Countries (AFRICOMM 2021)

Abstract

Adoption of eHealth among healthcare providers in Uganda is still facing numerous challenges despite several studies indicating the potential of digital health systems in improving health outcomes. Therefore, this study set out to investigate the barriers and facilitators of eHealth adoption among healthcare providers in Uganda. A cross-sectional study using a quantitative approach was used to collect data from 216 healthcare providers working in 78 health facilities covering a period of October 2020 – March 2021. Analysis was done using Pearson’s Chi-square and descriptive statistics. Main findings indicated that 59% of the respondents had never used any eHealth system prior to the study. The regional distribution of eHealth uptake showed that Kampala had the highest users 61 (69%) while Gulu had the least 4 (5%). Employing a .05 criterion of statistical significance, the findings reveal that eHealth adoption and education level (χ2 = 40.72, ρ < 0.05), age (χ2 = 13.08, ρ < 0.05), location (χ2 = 20.96, ρ < 0.05), gender (χ2 = 4.40, ρ < 0.05) and institutional place of work (χ2 = 49.67, ρ < 0.05) are statistically significant. Furthermore, training users, ease of use, usefulness of the system and communicating eHealth benefits (µ = 4.15 ± .758, µ = 4.05 ± .888, µ = 3.76 ± .836, µ = 3.93 ± .827) had the highest mean contribution as facilitators of eHealth adoption, respectively. Any policy that targets integration of eHealth should take into account the demographic characteristics of health professionals, while paying attention to the organizational and technological factors. Future research should investigate eHealth adoption in patients and hospital administrators.

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Acknowledgement

Sincere gratitude goes out to the management of the different health facilities for the support extended during data collection. Similarly, appreciation goes out to the research assistants and the participants whose involvement in this study was very pivotal. Lastly, I would like to extend since gratification to the Government of Uganda, through the Makerere University, Research and Innovations Fund for funding this research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Information Systems, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda

    Hasifah K. Namatovu, Agnes R. Semwanga, Livingstone Ndigezza & Mark A. Magumba

  2. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Makerere University School of Public Health, Kampala, Uganda

    Vincent M. Kiberu

  3. Department of Networks, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda

    Swaib K. Kyanda

Authors
  1. Hasifah K. Namatovu
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  2. Agnes R. Semwanga
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  3. Vincent M. Kiberu
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  4. Livingstone Ndigezza
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Correspondence to Hasifah K. Namatovu .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. State University of Zanzibar, Zanzibar, Tanzania

    Yahya H. Sheikh

  2. State University of Zanzibar, Zanzibar, Tanzania

    Idris A. Rai

  3. State University of Zanzibar, Zanzibar, Tanzania

    Abubakar D. Bakar

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Namatovu, H.K., Semwanga, A.R., Kiberu, V.M., Ndigezza, L., Magumba, M.A., Kyanda, S.K. (2022). Barriers and Facilitators of eHealth Adoption Among Healthcare Providers in Uganda – A Quantitative Study. In: Sheikh, Y.H., Rai, I.A., Bakar, A.D. (eds) e-Infrastructure and e-Services for Developing Countries. AFRICOMM 2021. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol 443. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-06374-9_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-06374-9_15

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