The Internet: another facet to the paradigm shift in healthcare

The Internet is an extremely powerful innovation that has and will continue to shape the healthcare industry in the years to come. Albeit a little too slowly, doctors are starting to catch onto this new wave of digital empowerment and creating niches that will enhance their ability to care for their patients and ultimately add value to their practices. The challenge is to encourage every doctor to come on board. The paradigm shift in healthcare delivery is that the Internet brings about the power of information to the patient. This balances the power in the doctor patient relationship. Taken positively, the doctor too can benefit from Internet technology. The biggest contribution of the Internet in the area of electronic medical records is the web-based display environment that is operating-system independent. The Internet can therefore be exploited to provide a supra system that can draw personal medical information together from anywhere to create a virtual electronic medical record. The Internet can also be used to shape up an Internet-based healthcare delivery system. The healthcare delivery paradigm shift brought about by the Internet calls for an eHealth strategy.