Health Care Embraces Mobility

“Enterprise mobility has emerged as a top strategic initiative among leading health care organizations. The ability of a health care organization to connect the right information with the right caregiver regardless of location or circumstance, enterprise mobility has the potential to increase patient safety and caregiver efficiency. To benchmark the current state of adoption, Motorola’s Enterprise Mobility business conducted independent research among a representative sample of various decision-makers, the chief purchasers of mobility solutions and mobile workers within the health care industry.”
Article
Jeff Schou, HHNMostWired, 4 June 2008

Health IT and the disadvantaged

“One of the big promises of health IT is that it will help improve health care by capturing vast amounts of data about treatments, procedures and payments.
Using electronic health record systems, registries, and other health IT systems, clinical data will be crunched to find how one treatment protocol performed against another. This data will also be used to make the case for re-orienting health care payment incentives toward preventive or chronic care and away from the acute care side of the ledger.”
Article
Paul McCloskey, Government Health IT, 11 March 2008

Interoperability road map in development

“A Turkish research consortium is developing a road map for e-health interoperability that would eventually link up the health information systems of EU Member States in a seamless web.
Researchers at the Software Research and Development Centre, based in the Middle East Technical University (METU), have found that Europeans are more mobile than ever before, but although European health services have introduced sophisticated electronic information management systems, they are often designed to work on a local level and are often not interoperable.”
Article
e-Health Europe, 11 February 2008

Seamless European e-health web

“Europeans are becoming more mobile and healthcare systems have to keep up. A research consortium is seeking to chart a road map for e-health interoperability that would eventually hook up the health information systems of Member States in a seamless web.
Europeans are more mobile than ever before, moving not only around their own countries, but also across a largely borderless EU, in pursuit of leisure, education, career advancement or cultural enrichment. In addition, healthcare has changed significantly, with fewer people sticking to the same doctor, more patients visiting different specialists, health workers moving around more, as well as the emergence of e-health technologies which allow remote treatment and consultations.”
Article
Science Centric, 7 January 2008

Citizen Empowerment Using Healthcare and Welfare Cards

Paul Cheshire
(Atos Origin (UK); Chair EFMI WG Cards)

Abstract

Cards are used in health and welfare to establish the identity of the person presenting the card; to prove their entitlement to a welfare or healthcare service; to store data needed within the care process; and to store data to use in the administration process. There is a desire to empower citizens - to give them greater control over their lives, their health and wellbeing. How can a healthcare and welfare card support this aim? Does having a card empower the citizen? What can a citizen do more easily, reliably, securely or cost-effectively because they have a card? A number of possibilities include: Choice of service provider; Mobility across regional and national boundaries; Privacy; and Anonymity. But in all of these possibilities a card is just one component of a total system and process, and there may be other solutions - technological and manual. There are risks and problems from relying on a card; and issues of Inclusion for people who are unable use a card. The article concludes that: cards need to be viewed in the context of the whole solution; cards are not the only technological mechanism; cards are not the best mechanism in all circumstances; but cards are very convenient method in very many situations.

eHealth and the Internal Market

Workshop Organizer:
European Health Telematics Organisation (EHTEL)

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