Knowledge Delivery and Behavioral Healthcare Professionals

Abstract

Health care is the largest information business in the United States economy. One third of its trillion-dollar cost is the cost of creating and processing infor­mation.¹ The general lack of standards makes it difficult, expensive, and time-consuming to establish the simplest forms of communications. If it is difficult for patients to get a second opinion or to compare outcomes data for different institutions or procedures, imagine how difficult it is for a clinician to scan the qualifications of specialists in order to make a referral. This chapter discusses the science, history, and trends related to information and knowledge sharing and how technology will transform the behavioral health “knowledge worker” for years to come.