Digital Health Platform Ecosystem and Patient-centred Care Enhancement: Healthcare Stakeholders' Perceptions of Heavyweight and Lightweight IT in Innovation, Adoption, and Scaling

This research discusses findings from a study of the perceptions of primary healthcare stakeholders’ in enhancing patient-centred care through a digital health platform ecosystem. Using critical realism as a philosophical paradigm, the study involves an embedded case study of four departments at Cabrini Health, a private healthcare organisation in Victoria, Australia. Findings show that the platformisation of the digital health infrastructure improved generativity, with interrelated relationships between innovation, adoption, and scaling, resulting in enhancement in patient-centricity. In this respect, the research identified governance of the digital health platform as an obstacle. This research adds to the limited literature on digital health platform ecosystems and the enhancement of patient-centred care. The transferability of knowledge from this project contributes to researchers, healthcare practitioners, and policymakers seeking to enhance patient-centred care via the platformisation of their digital health infrastructure.