health tech report
Health information systems in Ireland New telecommunication equipment for telenursing at Health Sciences North, Horizon Santé-Nord (HSN) in Ontario, Canada.
In June 2021, the ESRI published Developments in health information systems in Ireland and internationally. The report’s objective was to provide a comprehensive overview of Ireland’s health information context and determine components of international healthcare systems that could be deployed in Ireland to enhance the existing healthcare system. Omnipresent and dynamic challenges faced by the healthcare systems as a consequence of increased demand, increasingly complex requirements and the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic have combined to drive the development of HIS and enhance eHealth. Since it became apparent that the Covid-19 pandemic required real-time interventions by healthcare decisionmakers, there has been a catalytic impact on the adoption of health technology. At the same time, the pandemic has provoked significant public engagement with health data, potentially acting as an impetus to sustain public buy-in and increase investment in a modern HIS and health data collection. Cognisant of the broad scope of health information systems (HIS), eHealth and health technology, the authors of the ESRI report, Brendan Walsh, Ciarán Mac Domhnaill and Gretta Mohan, 88
homed in on components which are most pertinent to policymakers in an Irish context. As such, its HIS report explored three core areas: 1. characteristics of successful international health information systems; 2. Ireland’s health information system and the health data context; and 3. telemedicine deployment during the pandemic.
Characteristics of successful international HIS In order to establish a framework with which to view and understand Ireland’s current HIS context, the ESRI sought to explore and record key features of international HIS. In doing so, several commonalities were discovered among effective HIS.
The first commonality is the national deployment of an individual health identifier (IHI). In Scotland, for instance, the Community Health Index (CHI) uniquely identifies individuals on a national register which is incorporated in numerous electronic medical recording systems in the NHS Scotland system. The second commonality is the creation of a national electronic health record (EHR). EHRs enable information to be coherently linked between different components of a healthcare system. Interoperability between healthcare data systems is essential to unlocking the optimal benefits of health informatics. For example, the NHS Spine database in England links healthcare IT systems across services and providers, facilitating the secure sharing of information as per its eReferral Service. Similarly, during the pandemic, New Zealand’s National Health Index (NHI)
