Health Innovation Design and Evaluation Research Team

In their ongoing efforts to improve health outcomes, decrease health care costs, and increase administrative efficiency, health care agencies are increasingly investing in information-based technologies (IT). Recently, the Canadian government highlighted the need for developing new methods for evaluating new health sector technologies in order to provide insight into the challenges associated with increased use of IT in health care settings. This award supports the development of a team that is researching the use of IT for epidemiological data collection (EDC), also known as e-epidemiology. The team’s goals include: identifying technological, organizational, governance and implementation challenges associated with the increased use of IT for EDC; addressing data quality issues arising from increased use of IT for EDC; and improving collaborations among researchers, decision makers and technology developers across disciplines who share an interest in e-epidemiology. The team hopes to improve the quality of evidence used in decision making about information technologies used for collecting epidemiological data in BC.