Description (short summary):Â Â
The Swedish Ministry of Health and Social Affairs launched an initiative in 2008 to enhance the understanding of how improvements in healthcare can be supported by technology and how these technologies are connected to political goals. This was accomplished by using a new benefit model in which benefits of continued implementation of technologies are calculated based on current medical and technology status. Six member states participated in the study: the Czech Republic, France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Spain and the United Kingdom.
The purpose of this report is to provide a summary of the work undertaken, the results and the conclusions reached.
The report shows that there is a significant healthcare improvement potential using eHealth as a catalyst. For the five political goals used in the study, the technology adoption is lower than 30Â %. The potential improvements are of such magnitude that they demand both attention and action from all member states.
Examples of quantified potentials include:
- 5 million yearly outpatient prescription errors could be avoided through the use of Electronic Transfer of Prescriptions
- 100 000 yearly inpatient adverse drug events could be avoided through Computerised Physician Order Entry and Clinical Decision Support. This would in turn free up 700 000 bed-days yearly, an opportunity for increasing throughput and decreasing waiting times, corresponding to a value of almost €300 million.
- 9 million bed-days yearly could be freed up through the use of Computer-Based Patient Records, an opportunity for either increasing throughput or decreasing waiting times, corresponding to a value of nearly €3.7 billion. The challenge of locating reliable data was a key issue when performing the study. In medicine, the demand for evidence has always been high and in that light it is paradoxical that key metrics related to healthcare quality, efficiency and availability of care are tracked in a scattered way, if measured at all.
The authors of the report stress the necessity for each of the member states to:
- Prioritise eHealth initiatives based on political goals and documented benefits;
- Improve measurement and collection of healthcare statistics related to eHealth;
- Continue to improve and develop present systems, and work on the communication of delivered success;
- Develop methods to evaluate, track and reduce medical errors and wastage of resource;
- Create a culture, which promotes development and praises success.
Number of pages: 84
Nature of documentation: Official reports and studies