28 June 2008
Ready to go in 2010: National online health record system
The Straits Times - pg H5

By Lee Hui Chieh

FROM 2010, patients will be able to move between polyclinics or their family doctors and public, private and community hospitals seamlessly, without having to lug their medication and test results around or retake tests.

This is because their doctors will be able to check their health records electronically. Each patient's data will be in a consolidated file containing notes on his medical condition, drug allergies, treatment and test results.

The Ministry of Health plans to have such a national electronic health-record system in place by then, said Dr Sarah Christine Muttitt, chief information officer of MOH Holdings, the ministry's corporate arm.

The system will improve treatment by giving doctors more information on their patients. It will also save time - and costs - since tests already done will not need to be repeated, she said yesterday at a seminar attended by more than 200 doctors and IT professionals in health care.

Hospitals and polyclinics under the public health-care groups here - the National Healthcare Group (NHG) and Singapore Health Services (SingHealth) - and some community hospitals now share some of their patients' electronic medical records.

But lab test results, scans and summaries compiled upon a patient's discharge from hospital are still stored in separate files and inaccessible to private hospitals and clinics. 

The proposed national system will integrate the disparate bits in one place, and include the private sector.

Yesterday's seminar was held to launch a non-profit group, Health Level Seven (HL7), which will lobby health-care groups here to adopt one set of standards - its standards - for their IT systems.

This will enable information to be shared across organisations and lay the
foundation for the national system.

HL7, a Singapore affiliate of an American group of the same name, will train those interested in adopting the standards.

It comprises representatives from the following health-care and IT organisations: NHG, SingHealth, Ambis, Healthe, Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society, Microsoft, NCS and Oracle.

HL7 chairman Fong Choon Khin, who is also SingHealth's group chief technology officer, said: "It's timely for us to set this up, since we are working towards a national electronic health-record system."

Raffles Medical Group said its new IT system, to kick in by the year end, already meets HL7 standards.