SPECIAL ISSUE - CALL FOR PAPER The transformative power of digital healthcare: New challenges and research opportunities

2025-01-30

SPECIAL ISSUE - CALL FOR PAPER

The transformative power of digital healthcare:

New challenges and research opportunities

 

 

 

As Orlikowski and Iacono (2001) emphasize, information systems (IS) researchers not only have the opportunity to influence the future, but they also have the responsibility to do so by documenting what digital technologies change, capturing what disappears, and what is being created.

 

In the healthcare sector, recent years have been marked by massive growth in innovations and the implementation of digital technologies: the development of mobile health (Motammarri et al., 2014; Ghose et al., 2022), the deployment of digital patient monitoring devices (Chan et al., 2020), the operationalization of integrated electronic medical records systems (Eden et al., 2022), the introduction of artificial intelligence applied to clinical diagnostics (Anichini & Geffroy, 2021, Abdel-Karim et al., 2023), the development of immersive therapies via virtual reality (Lacity et al., 2023), and the use of blockchain technology (Dubovitskaya et al., 2020). However, beyond the proliferation of innovative digital devices, what now stands out seems to be of a different order: their interdependence, which nurtures new forms of complexity, the quantification at work (data-intensive medicine), and the unprecedented modes of instantaneous calculation (algorithmic medicine) that support them, as well as the connectivity challenges (telemedicine)... all of which are dynamics that could greatly amplify the transformative power of digital technologies.

 

Data analysis and Artificial Intelligence (AI), driven by the acceleration of data collection in the sector, are ushering in disruptions and radical innovations in healthcare.

 

For example, rapid advancements in AI are creating new opportunities in healthcare. These technologies alone have a transformative power on the industry and society. But through their integration, their disruptive effects increase exponentially, raising new issues.

Thus, the more organizations collect data due to increased integration of digital devices, the more the issue of privacy protection becomes critical (considering the sensitivity of the data collected and processed). With the dissemination of self-learning algorithms, cybersecurity concerns become even more critical. This new generation of digital innovations also raises new governance questions, particularly regarding the involvement of new stakeholders in healthcare system analysis, represented by the intervention of non-human agents in automated and algorithmic decision systems (Niederman & Baker, 2023).

 

Similarly, explainability, accountability, relationships between healthcare professionals, and the organization of work represent major challenges associated with the use of AI in healthcare organizations (Schwennesen, 2019; Choudhury & Asan, 2022; Siala & Wang, 2022). The complexity of algorithms and the colossal volume of data used by AI make it extremely difficult to understand and thus explain the functioning and results produced by AI; deep learning is a prominent example of this (Lebovitz et al., 2021). The question of responsibility for healthcare professionals and the organizations to which they belong becomes even more acute when they use this technology (Reis et al., 2020; Lebovitz et al., 2021). From a managerial perspective, the use of AI is a major disruptive element in healthcare management systems (Cavallone & Palumbo, 2020), contributing to the transformation of relationships among stakeholders and the emergence of new work organizations that require new skills. Providing patients with broader access to healthcare via telemedicine or connected devices for remote monitoring profoundly changes the organization of care and the role of the patient. It also raises numerous challenges in terms of health equity and trust (Petersen et al., 2019).

 

For some, this represents a significant break (Davenport et al., 2019; Mesko et al., 2017). For others, technological advancements in healthcare oscillate between continuity and a shift. Many studies have shown that the impact of early generations of information technology on healthcare has been far below expectations (Payton et al., 2011; Eden et al., 2018). And even though the COVID crisis accelerated the digital transformation of the healthcare sector (Lin et al., 2021), the sector, and even more so the medico-social sector, remain marked by slow adoption of innovations in digital health technologies.

 

The transformative potential of digital technologies in the healthcare sector remains complex to grasp, as it is embedded in structural specificities. These includes:

 

  • The complexity of the domain, related to the multiplicity of competing and/or cooperating actors (industrials, consumers, patients, healthcare professionals, insurance companies...), and an institutional environment also characterized by multiple levels of regulation and the power of professional bodies.

 

  • The ongoing challenge of integrating legacy systems, the diversity of technological platforms, and strict regulations that pose major interoperability issues. Governments, providers, and users must agree on interoperability and standardization frameworks in a constantly evolving regulatory context (Spil et al., 2007).

 

  • Barriers to the diffusion of technologies. Each new technology integrated into the healthcare pathway introduces a multiplicity of changes in the existing context, creating obstacles and resistance. These changes may affect the social and spatial organization of care, the division of medical and paramedical labor, and interactions among various stakeholders. They can concern the work activities themselves, as well as the levels of knowledge and professional identities (Lapointe & Rivard, 2005; Liang & Xue, 2022).

 

  • The power dynamics at play in the healthcare industry, highlighted in studies on IS governance and the direction of AI development (Xue et al., 2008; Dwivedi et al., 2021). Also, the internal power dynamics within a healthcare organization, as well as the external dynamics that often play out between patients and caregivers (Woodside, 2016).

 

Is the transformative power of digital technologies in healthcare likely to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of healthcare systems? As the World Health Organization (2021) reminds us, digital innovations aim to transform the delivery of healthcare services, making them more accessible, personalized, and potentially more efficient.

 

Call for Papers:


Emerging technologies in healthcare present new challenges and renew issues due to the unpredictable discontinuities brought about by technologies like AI and their integration, or even their expansion across the entire sector. They offer significant opportunities for future research and the potential to renew theoretical and methodological approaches in IS management (White Baker et al., 2023).


In order to overcome past difficulties and address the complexity of the field, Payton et al., (2011) advocate for interdisciplinary approaches in healthcare and information technology. The healthcare field represents "a rich environment from which new theories can be developed and existing theories extended in the field of IS" (Chiasson & Davidson, 2004).

This special issue is open to contributions from interdisciplinary (Chen et al., 2019) and sociotechnical perspectives, often considered one of the foundational viewpoints in IS discipline (Sarker et al., 2019). Submissions should focus on the ongoing transformations driven by innovative digital health technologies and grasp the magnitude of these changes. Contributions on the medico-social sector, which is currently under-researched, will be appreciated (Bonjour et al., 2018). Contributions may include empirical, theoretical, or meta-analysis papers.

 

Examples of topics that may be addressed include:

  • The challenges of AI in healthcare (ethics, responsibility, etc.),

  • Patient empowerment and healthcare democracy,

  • The "techno-push" dynamics of digital health technologies and industrial influence on the pace and direction of innovations in this field (particularly AI),

  • The challenge of new forms of multi-level governance in healthcare,

  • The new generation of digital health technologies and their vulnerabilities,

  • The care pathway and technologies,

  • Hospital-city cooperation/coordination,

  • …

 

Submission guidelines


Submissions are open to all and can include empirical papers, meta-analyses, literature reviews, and new theoretical frameworks.

Papers may be submitted in French or English; final versions will be in English (with copy editing).
Articles must be submitted in full and must adhere to the submission guidelines of the SIM journal. http://revuesim.org/index.php/sim/about/submissions

 

Important Dates


Submission Deadline: September 30, 2025

First-round Notification: December 20, 2025

Revision Deadline: March 20, 2026

Second/Final Decision by Invited Editors: Early June 2026

Publication Decision by Editorial Board: July 2026

Publication Date: September 2026

 

Co-editors of the Special Issue

 

Valérie Fernandez (Valerie.fernandez@telecom-paris.fr)

Bénédicte Geffroy (Benedicte.geffroy@imt-atlantique.fr)

Liette Lapointe (liette.lapointe@mcgill.ca)

Jean-François Berthevas (jean-francois.berthevas@univ-lr.fr)

 

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