This ADHA release appeared a few days ago.
Connecting Australian health care
By Dr Holger
Kaufmann* - ADHA
Friday, 09 September, 2022
In a healthcare system that values cutting-edge technology to diagnose, treat and manage conditions, consistent sharing of consumer health information remains an elusive target. Australia has key systems in place to enable and support standardisation and connected health systems, such as national healthcare identifiers, and continues to make progress as shown by the rapid national uptake of electronic prescribing which was accelerated by the challenging COVID environment.
Consumers want a connected healthcare system
Despite this, there is growing impatience among consumers and healthcare providers for a more connected healthcare system as the healthcare sector lags behind other industries in adopting digital technologies and standards that deliver seamless connectivity. In 2022, cancers can be treated with sophisticated biological medicines tailored to the genotype of the cancer in question and advanced surgical techniques have revolutionised how once major surgeries are carried out as minimally invasive interventions.
What hasn’t changed is the way consumer health information is shared through the health system — still to a large extent by paper, with inadequate and inconsistent presentation of the information required to safely manage consumer’s information.
Connected care and consumer experience
Consumers have told us that repeating their story for every new clinician reduces the trust that they have in the system and alters their perception of their healthcare experience. Disparate systems within health services often have limited integration. So, while demographic information may flow seamlessly throughout the health service environment, clinical information may be siloed in different systems, such as oncology, acute care clinical information systems and outpatient systems.
Worse, when a consumer has multiple healthcare providers, printed summary information from one system needs to be transcribed into the next system. Transcription or manual entry of incomplete data is often the only means of clinical information system integration and fraught with potential sources of error.
Building the connected system Australians want
The Connecting Australian Health Care — National Healthcare Interoperability Plan (the Plan) aims to accelerate the digital transformation of healthcare delivery in a first-of-a-kind, nationally agreed and coordinated effort. A connected healthcare system benefits all participants by providing consumers with access to their health information when and where they want or need it and aligns to the Australian Charter of Healthcare Rights (second edition). A connected healthcare system supports clinicians and care team members by ensuring those appropriately authorised have access to contemporary and historical clinical information to guide decision-making and potentially reduce duplication and waste.
The Plan includes 10 principles, five priority areas and 44 actions to progress over the next five years. The actions were developed in broad consultation with stakeholders across the health and care sectors. The Australian Digital Health Agency (the Agency) will lead and coordinate the implementation of the Plan. With access to leading health and technical experts the Agency is ideally placed to ensure the objectives of the plan are delivered.
The Plan will address inequality through inclusivity, with a national push towards ensuring that Australians of all ages, locations and cultural backgrounds are supported to access healthcare and health information. This will be done through digital health approaches that meet their needs — including that digital health works effectively to help ‘close the gap’ in health outcomes between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and non-Indigenous Australians.
The Agency is currently stewarding the Plan through the intergovernmental approval process and will publish the Plan on the Agency’s website once approved. In the meantime work has commenced on key fundamental building blocks for connecting healthcare, including:
- Implementing a Healthcare Identifiers Roadmap to increase the adoption, for ensuring consumers and providers are identified accurately.
- Publishing the first edition of a National Catalogue for Digital Health Standards that will provide a single point of information to support the use of digital health standards for software developers and health information managers.
- Developing guidelines for decision-makers that highlight the importance of digital health standards when making investment decisions for information and communications technology in our health services — support materials will make it easy to incorporate these guidelines into tender requirements ensuring new systems are purchased with connectivity to the health system in mind.
- Developing a healthcare connectivity toolkit and educational materials that build capability and capacity in Australian healthcare workers, managers and software developers.
- Conducting a baseline survey of interoperability in a range of healthcare settings that will support ongoing measurement of our progress.
Everyone can contribute to connecting Australian healthcare
Health service staff can help the implemenation of the Plan in a number of ways. Promoting the point of care collection of healthcare identifiers to complete patient profiles in clinical information systems is one easy action that can be done from today. Influencing colleagues to ensure high-quality discharge summaries are issued to consumers as they leave the healthcare service and simultaneously sent to the consumer’s My Health Record is another.
There is a role for everyone involved in health care in Australia to achieve the target state where consumer health information can be shared safely, securely and seamlessly across the consumer healthcare journey.
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*Dr Holger Kaufmann is the Acting Chief Digital Officer, responsible for reviewing international experience and trends and local innovation to help set the national digital health agenda for the Australian health sector. Holger has over 20 years’ experience in digital delivery and innovation and holds a PhD in theoretical physics from the University of Cambridge, UK. Digital innovation in health care has been a long-time passion for him.
More here:
And the release was republished with some odd omissions by a self-promoting Chess Grand Master and activist!
Australian Healthcare Connect
Published September 10, 2022
By
In a healthcare system that values cutting-edge technology to diagnose, treat, and manage conditions, continuous sharing of consumer health information remains an elusive goal. Australia has key systems in place that enable and support standardization, as well as connected health systems. This is evident by the rapid uptake of electronic prescriptions in Australia, which was accelerated by the complex COVID environment.
Consumers demand a connected healthcare network
However, consumers and healthcare providers are becoming more impatient to have a connected healthcare system. Healthcare is still behind other industries when it comes to digital technologies and standards for seamless connectivity. Advanced biological drugs can now be used to treat cancers. In addition, advanced surgical techniques will revolutionize how major operations are done as minimally invasive procedures.
The way that consumer health information is shared within the health system has not changed. It is still done largely on paper with inconsistent and insufficient presentation of information necessary to manage consumer information.
Connected care and consumer experience
We have heard from consumers that telling the same story to each doctor reduces trust in the system, and can change their perceptions of their healthcare experience. It is not always possible to integrate disparate systems within healthcare services. Although demographic information flows smoothly through the health care environment, clinical data may be separated in different systems like oncology, acute-care clinical information systems and outpatient systems.
Even worse is the fact that printed summary information from multiple healthcare providers must be copied to the next system for consumers with multiple healthcare providers. Sometimes, transcription or manual entry is all that is needed to integrate clinical information systems. This can lead to errors.
Australia’s Connected System: Building the Future
The Australian Healthcare Connectivity Scheme – National Healthcare Interoperability Scheme, (the Plan) is designed to accelerate the digital transformation and delivery of healthcare in a unique and coordinated effort. The Connected Healthcare Systems benefits all parties by providing consumers access to their health information whenever, wherever, and however they need it. This is in compliance with the Australian Charter of Healthcare Rights (Second edition). The connected healthcare system supports clinicians as well as members of the care teams by providing licensees with appropriate access to historical and current clinical information. This can help guide decision-making, and reduce duplication.
This plan includes 10 principles and five priority areas, as well as 44 actions that will be taken to achieve progress over the next five-years. These procedures were developed after extensive consultation with stakeholders in the health-care and healthcare sectors. The Australian Digital Health Agency, (the Agency), will oversee and coordinate the implementation of the plan. The agency has access to top health and technical experts so it is well placed to deliver the goals.
This plan will tackle inequality through inclusion, and a national push to ensure that all Australians have access to healthcare and information. Digital health will provide the best possible health care for all Australians. This includes ensuring that non-Indigenous Australians have access to digital health services that are tailored to their needs.
The plan is being sponsored by the agency through the intergovernmental approbation process. Once approved, the plan will be published on the agency’s site. The essential building blocks for healthcare connectivity have been identified and work is underway.
- To increase adoption of healthcare identifiers and to ensure that service providers and consumers are correctly identified, the roadmap must be implemented.
- Publication of the National Catalog of Digital Health Standards, the first edition that provides a single source of information for digital health standards developers and managers of health information.
- Create guidelines for decision makers that highlight the importance of digital standards when making ICT investment choices in our health services. Support materials can make it easy to incorporate these guidelines in bid requirements to ensure that new systems with contact with are purchased. Health system in mind
- Make educational tools and communication tools for the healthcare sector that increase the abilities and capabilities of Australian nurses, managers, and software developers.
- A baseline survey of interoperability across a variety of healthcare settings to support continuous measurement of our progress.
All can play a part in connecting Australian healthcare
In many ways, health service personnel can assist with the implementation of this plan. One of the easiest actions you can take is to promote a point of care pool of healthcare identifiers that complement patient profiles in clinical data systems. Another way to get your colleagues to make sure that discharge summaries of high quality are sent to My Health Record and issued to patients as they leave the health care facility is to encourage them to do so.
Everyone involved in Australian healthcare has a role to play in achieving the goal state of seamless sharing of consumer health information across all stages of the healthcare journey.
Highest Image Credit: iStockphoto.com/elenabs
Author
Belinda is a very experienced journalist and has worked for several leading news publications throughout Australia and the greater asia region. She is a chess grand master and a natural health activist.
Here is the link:
https://melbournenewsvine.com/australian-healthcare-connect/
Dealing with the serious part of the document the key is the plan outlined which says:
“The plan is being sponsored by the agency through the intergovernmental approbation process. Once approved, the plan will be published on the agency’s site. The essential building blocks for healthcare connectivity have been identified and work is underway.
- To increase adoption of healthcare identifiers and to ensure that service providers and consumers are correctly identified, the roadmap must be implemented.
- Publication of the National Catalog of Digital Health Standards, the first edition that provides a single source of information for digital health standards developers and managers of health information.
- Create guidelines for decision makers that highlight the importance of digital standards when making ICT investment choices in our health services. Support materials can make it easy to incorporate these guidelines in bid requirements to ensure that new systems with contact with are purchased. Health system in mind
- Make educational tools and communication tools for the healthcare sector that increase the abilities and capabilities of Australian nurses, managers, and software developers.
- A baseline survey of interoperability across a variety of healthcare settings to support continuous measurement of our progress.”
The thing
that just amazes me is that this addenda is what I thought NEHTA and the ADHA
were doing this for the last decade and now they seem to want another 5 years
to get going with it. The process has been glacial! Can anyone provide a reason
why any of the present executive should keep their job? Isn't it wonderful how every time we get a new executive we get a rehash of the same old plan!
As for Melbourne News Vine they are simply dishonest plagiarists who should be fined out of existence!
What a total farce showing how we are struggling for progress and being conned!
David.
Re "In a healthcare system that values cutting-edge technology to diagnose, treat and manage conditions, consistent sharing of consumer health information remains an elusive target."
ReplyDeleteThe implementation of the PCEHR was supposed to deliver "consistent sharing of consumer health information" in 2012
Below is taken from the Concept of Operations released in 2011. Notice particularly the section that starts "This will result in" and ask Did It? From ADHA's press release it is clear that it didn't. So what will they be doing that is different? And in case you don't know, the PCEHR didn't reduce data fragmentation - they couldn't solve the interoperability problem.
The need for a PCEHR System
The implementation and adoption of a national PCEHR System addresses a current challenge faced by the Australian health system — the fragmentation of information spread across a vast number of different locations and systems. In many healthcare situations, quick access to key health information about an individual is not always possible.
Limited access to health information at the point of care results in:
• A greater risk to patient safety.
• Increased costs of care and time wasted in collecting or finding
information.
• Unnecessary or duplicated treatment activities.
• Additional pressure on the health workforce.
• Reduced participation by individuals in their own healthcare information
management.
The purpose of the PCEHR System is to address information fragmentation by allowing a person to more easily access their own health information and make their health information securely accessible to different healthcare providers involved in their care.
This will result in:
• Improved continuity of care for individuals accessing multiple healthcare providers by enabling key health information to be available where and when it is needed to ensure safe ongoing care.
• Access to consolidated information about an individual’s medicines, leading to safer and more effective medication management and reductions in avoidable medication-related adverse events.
• Enabling individuals to participate more actively in their healthcare through improved access to their health information.
• Improved diagnostic and treatment capabilities through enhanced access to health information.
• Improved care coordination for individuals with chronic or complex conditions by enabling the individual’s healthcare team to make better informed decisions at the point of care.
• Improved continuity of care for individuals accessing multiple healthcare providers by enabling key health information to be available where and when it is needed to ensure safe ongoing care.
• Access to consolidated information about an individual’s medicines, leading to safer and more effective medication management and reductions in avoidable medication-related adverse events.
• Enabling individuals to participate more actively in their healthcare through improved access to their health information.
• Improved diagnostic and treatment capabilities through enhanced access to health information.
• Improved care coordination for individuals with chronic or complex conditions by enabling the individual’s healthcare team to make better informed decisions at the point of care.
Does this Belinda go by another name? She is not listed in the FIDE rankings and you cannot be a grand master any other way
ReplyDeleteA standards catalogue is wonderful but a catalogue won’t get you far. How exactly are the conformance agreements enforced? If we don’t have a common set of agreements that underpin the variety of commercial offerings then interoperability won’t happen - have ADHA learned nothing? What idiot advisors have they employed since the early standards work?
ReplyDeleteAs for the Jurisdictions they already have various policies and catalogues that outline everything from facilities to cabling to systems to be used in procurement.
ADHA Carrie’s no currency at a state and territory level resulting in this being an exercise in folly.
From the Melbourne News Vine website:
ReplyDelete"Melbourne News Vine is a Professional News Platform. Here we will provide you with only interesting content, which you will like very much."
"G. Carter said..."
ReplyDeleteA standards list is about as useful as a list of laws with no police force, courts or jails for offenders. We have had workable standards for 20 years, but compliance remains appalling as vendors know that no one will ever call them out for errors and they do not appear to care about the potential harm done to patients by missing or incorrect display of results. All the eHealth authorities have been clueless of this and I have given up trying to tell them as the appear to have no interest in fixing real world issues. They appear to be a way to funnel taxpayers $$ to multi-national companies, so actually fixing issues is not in their interests!