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The Business of
Health Care Report
When it comes to advances in technology that benefit all of us,
health care is often at the forefront. While new and improved televisions and cell phones can capture
our attention, many of these advancements are more accurately labeled as conveniences rather than necessities. Technological advances in health care - where lives are often
at stake - are often another matter. One technological mainstay - the Internet - is becoming an
increasingly valuable component for just about everyone, however. It's a tremendous convenience for many who use
it for everything from scheduling trips to searching for hard-to-find antiques. And it's becoming a necessity for
physicians embracing all that the Internet can provide - from conducting on-line research to communicating with
patients and other physicians. Dr. Ramon Garcia, a physician at Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas,
uses the Texas Health Resources bilingual Web site to help educate his Spanish-speaking patients about their health,
for example. None of this should be too surprising in light of a recent survey
by the American Medical Association. The AMA found that almost 80 percent of U.S. doctors use the Internet for work and
two-thirds of those access the Web on a daily basis - up from 24 percent five years ago. In addition, about 30 percent of the physicians using the Internet
have their own Web site - primarily to promote and advertise their practice or to provide patient education and information,
according to the AMA. And although younger physicians are more likely to use the Web than
their older counterparts, doctors over the age of 60 have increased their Internet usage by 22 percent in the last two
years. The survey's bottom line? Just about half of the 977 physicians surveyed
by the AMA said that the Internet has had a major, positive impact on the way they practice medicine. For Texas Health Resources
and its family of hospitals - Harris Methodist Hospitals, Presbyterian
Healthcare System and Arlington Memorial Hospital - I'm CEO Doug
Hawthorne with "The Business of Health Care Report" on NewsRadio
1080 KRLD.
©
2002 Texas Health Resources |
I'm Doug Hawthorne, President and CEO of Texas Health Resources, with
"The Business of Health Care Report" on 