EMR adoption in Dubai: Tendencies and Challenges

Electronic Medical Records (EMR) adoption in the UAE has rapidly enhanced in recent years. According to recent government policies, EMR systems are mandatory for every healthcare facility in the country. Still, different Emirates provide specific deadlines and conditions for software implementation and integration according to clinics' location.

The Dubai Emirate case is a good example that allows us to precisely track this "digital evolution" in the UAE due to the abundance of statistics from research papers provided by local Dubai Health Authorities and other research institutions.

These insights, in turn, make it possible for us to assess prospects and tendencies in the digitalization of the healthcare industry in general and dentistry in particular.

Technology Adoption Rate

In the study published last year by DHA, researchers analyzed all existing 2089 healthcare facilities in the Emirate to estimate the success of EMR implementation. As it turned out, 100% (54) of hospitals in Dubai and 75% (1460) of private clinics had already adopted this technology. In the case of hospitals, we can track the enhanced growth rate during the 2020s.

Who and how uses EMR in practice?

It's interesting that, according to another research paper from Indonesian scientists, nurses use EMR systems more frequently than physicians and allied health professionals in hospitals. This may be explained by the specifics of nurses' work processes, which require them to constantly complete various administrative and clinician tasks. For instance, another paper from the Universitas Indonesia researchers provides this group of specialists' most popular functions of the EMR environment.

And what about dental practitioners? A group of researchers from Indiana University conducted an extensive survey of dentists and found that they often use EMRs and Health Information Exchange systems to track patients' medical histories. Participants provided a list of the critical information they required during dental treatment.

The main challenges in EMR adoption

Despite the optimistic statistics regarding the extensive technology adoption rate, DHA research also provides a list of factors that make implementing the technology in hospitals difficult:

Slow integration – even though all hospitals in the UAE implemented the technology, 42% of them are at the most basic level (Stage 0 in the EMR Adoption Model) of technology adoption, which does not allow them to provide the full spectrum of specialists' tasks that are mentioned in the previous paragraph.
Lack of awareness about vendors – researchers highlight that hospitals are commonly unaware of which EMR vendor is the most effective and more suitable for their medical requirements.
Lack of qualified personnel – some healthcare facilities do not have enough qualified specialists that can effectively use the EMR system, which slows the adoption process

The human factor – specialists’ knowledge, skills, and awareness of EMR technologies – is probably the most crucial element of effective software implementation in regular practice. Despite the abovementioned problems, there is another important phenomenon – the so-called technostress. This issue is characterized by extensive emotional pressure on software/hardware users caused by an abundance of technological tools or overcomplicated interfaces.

Fortunately, in recent times, technology has become a subject of scientific research that has provided critical insights into this phenomenon. Last week, Dr. Khalil Karam – a prominent expert in digital dental transformation from the UAE – comprehensively reviewed existing studies and provided a list of possible solutions to reduce the technostress in practitioners.

Also, we have a list of insightful articles about digital software implementation in modern dentistry that you can find on our Newsfeed:

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