Systems Planning For My State Hospital: ICT Infrastructure, Methodology, Cost, And Risks

Requirement of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Infrastructure

Describe about the Systems Planning.
 

Like we all know that in today’s era of information technology, there is no sector in any industry that is not touched and impacted. The impact is positive in majorly all of the sectors, including hospitals. For healthcare sectors, there is a health informatics element, known as Hospital information system (HIS), which majorly focuses on all administrational related needs of hospitals. On similar grounds, for My State Hospital as well it is necessary as well as beneficial to implement smart handheld devices system as an effective interface to HIS, in order to improve the business process. In this part of the plan to implement such system in the hospital, we will discuss the information and communication technologies infrastructure that would be required for implementation of the plan. We will also discuss the implementation methodology and comprehensive costing and risk analysis alongside a roadmap to highlight the step of implementation.

With the development of information and communication technologies (ICTs), it has become possible to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of administration related tasks within the hospital to relocate hospital services from its office locations closer to its patients, such as cyber cafes or personal computers.

As a plan to bring implementation of smarter tools for My State Hospital, we require a stable, properly secured and an optimized ICT infrastructure, comprising the following appropriate elements:

1. Base – For backup and archiving: To secure the data we would need to create the backup of all the data to be implemented on the ICT infrastructure (Olsen, 1999). For creating the backup and archiving the data, we plan to use one and/or all of the following data centers:
2. Servers and data switch boards
3. UPS
4. Access Control System
5. CCTV

1. Data Connection – Iaas/Paas: To make the data accessible the end user and the staff of MY State hospital, we would require connecting the data and our servers with the locally available servers. And for this, we would require the connection with local data networks such as LAN/WAN, WiFi, and/or VolP.
2. The third step before making the data available and accessible to the end users, who are patients and the hospital staff, we would need to give ICT virtualization to the data. For this, we would require storage spaces on the local drive, servers to connect audience with the data, databases and middleware from where the data will be available to the end user easily and web servers to create backup of the data in safe and secure form, so that it can be retrieved during later stage if needed (Sharp &Salter, 1997).
3. The last step would be to make this data available to the end user. And for this, we would clearly require the notebooks, desktops and workstation and or smart drive to the staff of My State Hospital, so in case if any patient would like the staff to have access of their data and provide any information, the staff should not be deprive of the resources and or the knowledge about stable and optimized usage of ICT infrastructure, that would be implemented in the My State Hospital.

An established, optimized and properly protected ICT infrastructure, consisting of correct elements, is the requirement of the proper operation of important information system has the following key features:

1. Proper technology
2. Optimal processes
3. Continuity of operations
4. Sustainable cost 

As a part of our plan to improve the technology services at My State Hospital, we have come up with a plan for system implementation. The process is split into various steps or phases to help decrease the disruption to the business of My State hospital. The following steps are an example of how are planning to approach the system implementation:

1. Initiation: We are currently in this phase of system implementation. After the go ahead a project manager will be assigned to who will help us in designing the plan of how the system will be implemented in My State Hospital. There will be recommendation from the project manager about what approach would best fulfils the needs of the business. He will also determine whether or not the implementation project should be divided into phases. A project plan will also be created and shared with the management of My State Hospital for them to have a constant eye and understanding of progress at each stage (Reel, 1999).
2. Installation of Software: as simple as the name suggests, the second step would include the installation of the software on the hardware of My State Hospital.
3. Solution Design: after the installation of the software the team working under the project manager will present the product at the hospital’s workshop and the decision related to the design of the solution will be made. As a part of this, two documents will also be made:
4. Solution design document – this will a document which will require a sign off from the management of My State Hospital, which is ensure that the design is clear and accepted by the client.
5. System Design Document – This document will be used to build the solution in the systems of My State Hospital.

1. System Configuration: The solution will be configured in the test environment in adherence to the system design document.
2. Migration of data: This step of phase would require a careful planning and the system of data migration and responsibilities will be defined by the project manager for each of the migration steps. It will be the sole decision of the project manager to break the data migration process into whatever number of steps (Scott, 1999); however this will also depend on the legacy system, transfer of data, timing of the migration and availability of the resources that My State Hospital would provide.
3. User Training: this would be one of the most important stages of the complete process. The training will be provided to the entire staff of My State Hospital with a special focus on the specific requirement of the user.
4. Testing of User Acceptance: Post the training, a team of experts will be set-up to test the user acceptance of the new system that will be implemented. This team will provide the constant support to the users.
5. Go Live: A handholding support will be provided by the project manager and his team to make to system go-live and constant support will also be provided.
6. Reviews of the Project: This will be most important stage of the complete process, as it is the opportunity where the users will highlight any issues faced by them and/or if there are any scope of improvement in the system. 

As a part of system migration and implementation, My State Hospital would have to bear few expenses. The expenses will help the hospital improve its system to a definitely advanced version. Following would be the costs included in the process of system migration:

1. Employee Costs: This would include the complete cost of employees to be included in the process of system migration from the beginning. The cost will be associated with the cost of project managers, the team set up to implement the system or upload the software in the hardware of My State Hospital.
2. Equipment Costs: With the system up gradation or system migration, there comes an amount which would be a mandate to spend on the equipments, needed for the process.
3. System Migration Cost: Migration of system is an expensive process and requires a lot of licensing before this is done. And these licenses come with cost, which the hospital would have to bear.
4. Communication Cost: Communication is an important part of any changes happening in any organization. On similar grounds, My State Hospital will also have to pass the communication or the message to its employees and or the patients, who would be using the interface or the system. The communication would have some cost attached to it, which the hospital would have to include in its expenses or expenditures of the year.
5. Other Financial Costs: These would include all the miscellaneous costs or expenses related to the system implementation project. There could not any fixed costs attached to this head; therefore it would be difficult for the hospital to predict this cost. Hence, it would be better if My State Hospital keeps a little extra amount in its kitty to meet the miscellaneous expenses.

All in all these would be major forms of costs or expenses the hospital would have to bear to start as well as complete the process of system implementation. Other than this, the complete expenditure cost should also include depreciation of hardware, savings of the staff and various assumptions and restriction statements related to workers and operations (Hoffman, 2005).

The identification of risks related to system implementation has been a matter of research (Jiang, 1996; Zmud, 1980). For the project or system implementation to become successful, risks are needed or required to decreased or eliminated. We can also say that to maximize the scope of success, risks related to the tasks must be decreased to the least (Barki, 1993; Jiang & Klein, 1999). Following could be the risk factors that might be faced by My State Hospital. These risks should be taken care in order to decrease the chances of project failure:

1. Lack of alignment of the system implementation project and the process currently followed by My State Hospital – In order to make the system implementation project a success, the hospital needs to make sure that there are no gaps in the process of system implementation and the process thee hospital follows currently.
2. Loss in the Control due to Transfer of Decision Making – There could be chances that during the transfer of decision making process the hospital could lose the control on the data management system they are currently using (Staw,1987) . This could be one big factor of data spoliation, which is why there must be a proper control on the data, before implementing any plan of system migration.
3. Complexity of the Project – Since system implementation would be a new project for My State Hospital, there could be the chances that the users might not understand the usage of the system and it turns out to be complex system, which might end up scrapping the project altogether (Davenport, 2000). To avoid this, the hospital should do the regular communication sessions with the user, to receive their views and implement those in the project to avoid any complexity during the later stage.  

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