Smart hospitals continue to evolve in Korea
28-Sep-14, Korea Herald
Located in Bundang, Gyeonggi Province, Seoul National University Bundang Hospital is paperless ― quite literally. Here, kiosks and computers replace people and paper documents. All of the medical charts have been digitalized, along with the personal data of the patients. Visitors make reservations, pay and browse their medical histories through kiosks and smart devices.
Doctors and nurses know exactly how many hours ― or even minutes ― they have for each and every patient. Even during meetings and rounds, what they each carry is a smart tablet, not a pile of documents and pens.
The hospital is one of the major health care facilities in South Korea that is entirely “paperless” ― meaning it has a completely electronic medical record system, including data archiving and disaster recovery services.
Unlike the US and other countries, where hospitals are encouraged to adopt EMR systems by the government, hospitals in South Korea ― one of the most wired countries in the world ― are not required to go digital. But the number of facilities with the system has still increased dramatically here throughout the past decade.