Jussi Myllärniemi, Harri Laihonen, Henri Karppinen and Kaisa Seppänen
The purpose of the study is to develop understanding about the role of information and knowledge in healthcare processes and thereby create a basis for practices that would better…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the study is to develop understanding about the role of information and knowledge in healthcare processes and thereby create a basis for practices that would better support the actual service provision. This paper seeks to model and analyze the service processes of two case settings: laboratory and radiology units of a Finnish regional healthcare system.
Design/methodology/approach
The main actors, their knowledge needs, current knowledge practices and bottlenecks in knowledge flows were recognized. The paper combines conceptual analysis and empirical findings. The empirical data were collected in the autumn of 2010 and consist of 32 thematic interviews in two units of a healthcare organization in Finland. The themes of the interviews are related to current knowledge practices and processes.
Findings
The paper exemplifies an approach that provides a systematic basis for analyzing different aspects of knowledge management in healthcare processes. The approach provides valuable insights for analyzing knowledge‐based foundations of health services and it is expected that this analysis helps elaborate the practical knowledge processes of healthcare organizations.
Originality/value
The paper approaches health information management from the viewpoint of knowledge management discourse and highlights the importance of knowledge‐based value creation. Instead of mere information transfer or delivery the paper emphasizes the knowledge‐in‐use perspective. Despite the essential role of knowledge assets, the development efforts have mainly concentrated on solving local problems with context specific technical solutions.
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Keywords
This editorial of the special issue of Measuring Business Excellence is devoted to introduce and discuss a knowledge‐based perspective of innovation and performance improvement in…
Abstract
Purpose
This editorial of the special issue of Measuring Business Excellence is devoted to introduce and discuss a knowledge‐based perspective of innovation and performance improvement in health care (HC).
Design/methodology/approach
The approaches, evidences and insights discussed in this introduction are based on the discussion of the topics of the conference “International Forum on Knowledge Assets Dynamics” organised in June 2012 in Matera, Italy. After a brief analysis of the importance of the HC for research and practice related to the reform of HC sector that encompassed most OECD countries in the last 15 years and the diffusion of the new public management philosophy, the article presents a rationale explaining the roots and the meanings of a knowledge‐based perspective of innovation and performance improvement in HC. The model of the innovation cycle is introduced and discussed. Finally, the article provides an overview of the papers of the special issue.
Findings
At the conference, leading experts discussed the importance of identifying and managing new key‐value drivers in order to face emergent competitive scenarios, and research and management practices for addressing complexity, uncertainty and changes of today's business landscape. This article as well as all the contributions to the special issue provide useful implications both for research and practice. In particular they support the analysis about the resources, the assets, the processes, the factors and the contingency conditions playing a role in determining the improvement of the innovative capacity and consequently the global performance of the HC organisations.
Originality/value
This article – and the contributions to the special issue – deal with different aspects which are important in the discussion about how fostering innovation and performance improvement in HC organisations exploiting knowledge‐based factors. The articles also deal with the approaches, tools, methods and techniques that disentangle the mechanisms by which different knowledge‐based factors, separately or interdependently, contribute to improve HC organisations' innovation dynamics and organisational performance.
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Qian Lin, Haifeng Wu and Xi Li
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the temperature reliability for a parallel high-efficiency class-E power amplifier (PA).
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the temperature reliability for a parallel high-efficiency class-E power amplifier (PA).
Design/methodology/approach
To explore the relationship between temperature and direct current (DC) characteristics, output power, S parameters and efficiency of the PA quantitatively, a series of reliability experiments have been designed and conducted to study the temperature reliability for this PA.
Findings
From the results, the prominent performance degradation even failure is found during the testing. Furthermore, the thermal shock test can cause permanent failure, which is a great threat for PA.
Research limitations/implications
Therefore, to ensure the good performance, the influence of temperature on PA reliability should be carefully considered during the stage of PA design.
Practical implications
All these can provide important guidance for the reliability design of PA.
Social implications
All these can give some important guidance for PA application.
Originality/value
In addition, PA is usually designed according to the electrical properties at the room temperature. From the results above, it can be concluded that it may be unable to satisfy the performance requirement at high temperature. In turn, if it is designed according to the electrical properties at low temperature, the transistor often works in the super-saturated state, the reliability of PA will become the new problem. Therefore, to ensure the good performance, the influence of temperature on PA reliability should be carefully considered during the design.