The use of information technology significantly affected positive financial outcomes for 82 Florida hospitals, concludes a study published in the Journal of Healthcare Management. The hospitals, which were adjusted for case mix and bed size, that had the highest overall and operational financial performance were those with the largest number of clinical, administrative, and strategic IT programs. For example, hospitals with positive operating margin had 2.3 more clinical IT applications, 2.5 more administrative IT applications, and 6.0 more total IT applications--35.2 compared with 29.2 for negative performers. Not-for-profit hospitals had significantly higher adoption of IT programs than for-profits, except in the area of clinical IT initiatives.
