Designing health care information systems for integrated delivery systems: where we are and where we need to be.

A critical step in evolving an integrated delivery system (IDS) is planning, designing, and technologically realizing an efficient, appropriate, and effective infrastructure for developing an integrated network of information systems. The key to meeting this objective philosophically, logically, and physically in the face of rapid advances in computing technology and communication trends is often poorly understood by health providers and managers. The article discusses the concept of a total quality management information system model and illustrates how this sort of thinking can be applied to guide the critical steps that must be undertaken to plan, design, and develop a networked infrastructure of health care information systems that can facilitate information exchange and sharing among multiple health care providers within an IDS.