Johannesburg, 20 Aug 2015
South African healthcare providers have been urged to move towards a national integrated healthcare solution, which will enable the value of patient data to be optimised for analysis, research and investigation purposes.
Michael Graetz, Vice-President of the Healthcare business in EMC's Information Intelligence Group (IIG), says in addition to enabling university researchers to mine patient data, thereby improving the performance of system innovations, integrated healthcare solutions substantially improve the quality of care and make a tangible contribution to fighting fraud.
"Integrated national healthcare systems will fuel innovation of the next generation of health medicine," Graetz says. "Countries which don't move in this direction will inevitably lag behind, so it is vital for South Africa to begin the process of legislation, obtaining consent from the relevant parties, and implementing facilities to normalise the patient data."
Effective, enabling IT for integrated healthcare should be patient-centred, encompass structured and unstructured patient data, use common definitions and standards, be accessible to all parties, and be able to extract and analyse information. Graetz believes information is going to be the connective tissue of integrated care service delivery that spans the entire health value chain to provide more appropriate services to patients.
In South Africa, as in most of Europe, the Middle East and the rest of the African continent, 30% to 50% of patient information remains paper-based. Records are created along the care value chain; however, each app provides only one piece of the puzzle, making it difficult for doctors and other caregivers to obtain a holistic view or have a comprehensive understanding of the patient's history and condition.
EMC's Integrated Patient Record (IPR) solution enhances existing patient information by aggregating, sharing and optimising data for a complete, patient-centric view. This not only reduces costs, but improves clinical satisfaction and enables regulatory compliance as well as improved patient privacy.
The company's mission is to improve care by making patient data accurate and available, which will lead to better informed choices and empowered patients.
With its emphasis firmly on preventative care rather than acute care, EMC enables alternative care models to reduce costs, and increase shared IT services for clinics and hospitals.
"In Africa, bridging the gaps between skills and knowledge is vital. Once the appropriate systems are in place, doctors will have access to people living in rural areas, making it possible to provide equal care to all members of the population. For example, remote monitoring of rural communities using mobile devices will reduce the cost of systems and deliver enhanced support for the community. People in rural areas may not have laptops and PCs, but they do have mobile phones - and they can use them as a tool to interact with their healthcare providers," Graetz says.
Clinical information sharing can help doctors apply the latest findings of medical research, thereby providing personalised and evidence-based care services. This approach will go a long way towards closing the gap between large cities and remote areas.
"Ultimately, the goal is to manage central, integrated patient records which can be shared between different practices, and to deliver a meaningful value chain for the patient," Graetz says.
"Using mobile devices, caregivers can interact with patients and guide them to best manage their condition by providing advice on matters such as medication and clinic visits. This reduces queues as well as the overall workload at hospitals, and resolves patients' queries more efficiently."
The IPR solution handles all the information for each patient, from clinical notes to referrals, medication, radiology, hospital information systems and surgical procedures. Doctors can access the information through different sources, including audio and video format, and everything can be managed from one point. Confidentiality is maintained throughout, and access to the information is meticulously controlled using sophisticated authorisation techniques.
"There's no doubt that effective public health interventions and policies that target chronic diseases lead to a healthier population with lower healthcare spending, less school and workplace absenteeism, increased economic productivity and an improved quality of life," Graetz says.
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