Navigating the Systemic Conditions of a Digital Health Ecosystem in Alberta, Canada: Embedded Case Study.

Area of Science:

• Digital Health
• Health Systems Research
• Innovation Ecosystems

Background:

• Digital health offers significant value, including improved health outcomes and economic growth.
• Effective digital health ecosystems require coordinated stakeholder activities.
• Understanding the antecedents of this coordination is crucial but not well-established.

Purpose of the Study:

• Investigate systemic conditions in Alberta's digital health ecosystem.
• Identify critical antecedents to ecosystem coordination.
• Examine perspectives from innovators, health leaders, support partners, and funders.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative embedded case study design.
• Semistructured interviews with 36 diverse digital health stakeholders.
• Data synthesis around 5 propositions from literature and policy.

Main Results:

• Moderate support found for accessing problems, data, training, and evaluation space.
• A fundamental gap identified in ecosystem navigation.
• Absence of intermediaries hinders guidance on support services and actor dependencies.

Conclusions:

• Navigating digital health ecosystems is challenging, particularly for entrepreneurs.
• Intermediaries are crucial for guiding stakeholders within the ecosystem.
• Policy interventions promoting collaboration and coordination tools are essential for ecosystem growth.