European Market for Electronic Physician Order-Entry Systems

Motivated by the need to reduce medical errors and improve workflow, the European healthcare industry is increasingly turning to computerized physician order entry (CPOE) systems. Because of their interactivity and the growing use of mobile and wireless devices, the market for CPOEs is projected to reach U.S.$137 million by 2010, according to a new report from Frost & Sullivan (London, UK), market analysts.

"The current low size of the overall market is because only a handful of enterprise CPOE implementations have been carried out, the rest being several basic order entry systems as part of clinical information systems,” noted Siddharth Saha, a Frost & Sullivan analyst. "Once this nascent market matures, and a stable clinical information systems platform is in place to accept high-end CPOE systems, the market is expected to really take off.”

Both systems vendors and hospital management confront the challenge of realizing the true value that healthcare information technology (IT) solutions such as CPOE systems can deliver. With implementation being one of the most complex integration activities among healthcare information technology initiatives, a key area where vendors will focus maximum attention is the successful management of this costly, large-scale, complex, and change-inducing process.

In the next two years, the two largest country markets, Germany and France, are likely to experience a small but encouraging enterprise CPOE penetration level of 5%. Government-sponsored initiatives to modernize the healthcare information technology infrastructure are also likely to boost adoption rates in the United Kingdom. Scandinavia, too, is likely to witness the completion of several CPOE systems due to the high adoption there of technology solutions.