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Healthcare

Hong Kong approves budget for first phase of EHR

By Jianggan Li | 11 July 2009

The Legislative Council, Hong Kong’s parliament, has approved the funding of HK$720 million (US$ 93 million) for the first phase of the EHR project.

According to Dr K M Choy, Chief Manager (Service Transformation), Hospital Authority, the budget will be covering the operations, research and promotion of the EHR over five years.

The government will cover software development to connect the electronic medical record systems of private care providers to Hospital Authority’s central database. Public funding will also be spent on security & consultation. Choy also says that if the resources permit, the government also wants to involve some not-for-profit organisations such as old folk’s homes into the project.

The billion dollar project is expected to last 12 years before a territory-wide electronic health record system involving all care providers is established.

The linkages between public and private hospitals are expected to function as soon as in 2012 or 2013. General Practices will be included in a gradual process.

York Chow, Hong Kong’s Secretary for Food & Health reassured the public that security and privacy will be properly taken care of.

Hospital Authority, custodian of the territory’s public healthcare system, launched a pilot project three years ago by sharing its medical records to the private sector. To date, 1379 doctors are registered to use the system.

The government has made it clear that while investing in building the system, it would not subsidise private clinics the costs of software & hardware.

FutureGov was told that private hospitals are also expected to invest in building the linkages.

Hong Kong Sanatorium & Hospital, one of the largest private hospitals, has already shared its digital medical images with the central database. Negotiations are ongoing with other private hospitals.

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