Confusion surrounds federal, state and public authority proposals for a national e-health system in Australia, critics say. As competing bodies propose varied systems, no-one is consulting with privacy and civil liberties groups to ensure people’s health records are appropriately safeguarded and kept secure.
Privacy group criticises PR ‘spin’ over e-health
The Australian Privacy Foundation wants to work on positive developments for national electronic health system, instead of being forced to react to various poorly thought-through initiatives, the chair of the APF’s health sub-committee, Dr Juanita Fernando, said in June.
"Where is our national, widely consulted and accepted, patient-controlled, e-health records system, with an inbuilt privacy and personal health information security framework?" she said.
"Australians have spent billions of dollars on e-health yet we remain caught up in the realm of reactive detail, government press releases, information control and secrecy rather than in determining the principle decisions which can be used to found a good discussion of e-health proposals.
"The APF’s health sub-committee has written to Health Minister Nicola Roxon on the issue, and we patiently await a response," Dr Fernando said.
Her comments follow criticism of the Minister, who came out in early June with a media statement over a proposed e-health system, which only confused the already muddled area, forcing her into ‘clarifications’ in the following days.
The problem – as CLA pointed out in its June newsletter – is that there’s a Heinz-like proliferation of e-health proposals:
- The National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission (NHHRC) has announced its support for an electronic health record for every Australian. NHHRC Chair, Dr Christine Bennett, released a paper which spells out the Commission’s position.
- The National Electronic Health Transition Authority (NEHTA) says 82% of consumers in Australia support the establishment of an electronic health record…and NEHTA is working up its own proposal.
- Meanwhile, the NSW Health Minister John Della Bosca recently announced he was rushing new electronic medical records (eMR) technology into the state’s public hospitals ahead of any national agreement on standards of privacy and the safety of people’s health records. All doctors, nurses, allied health and social workers throughout NSW would be able to access a centralised repository of a patient’s medical chart, laboratory results, prescriptions and referrals, no matter where the patient enters the health system.
And you can bet that other states and territories are well advanced on their own systems.
The national rail gauge issue was a doddle by comparison with getting Australia-wide agreement on health records…and no public authority has yet undertaken full and open consultation with bodies like the APF and CLA.