 Welcome
to the second issue of Connectivity
Welcome to the second issue of Connectivity - HealthLink's
e-newsletter updating Australia's health professionals on developments
in e-health across the nation.
We wish all of our friends and colleagues a very pleasant and
relaxing Christmas. HealthLink's services will continue to operate
throughout the Christmas period and our support desk will operate
with normal hours of support.
|
|
|
What are Australia's General Practices Thinking?
Recently HealthLink surveyed nearly 2000 practices across Victoria
and Queensland. A significant proportion of Australia's medical
practices are unhappy with the current way in which they are communicating
with their colleagues across the sector. Practices clearly want
to have an integrated electronic communications system.
The vast majority of respondents (90%) indicated that an integrated
electronic communications system would be extremely useful to
them. Nearly 60% of respondents want to at least try an integrated
system as soon as possible. Some of the respondents said that
they will do everything they can to support and encourage use
of an integrated system.
We are not surprised that Australian medical practices are concerned
at the level of electronic communications. In other countries
such as Denmark and New Zealand, high quality electronic communications
are widely implemented. The effectiveness provided by integrated
communications has a significant impact upon both the efficiency
of day to day practice and the quality of care those practices
can provide.
|
|
|
Are You Particularly Keen to become a fully paperless practice?
We would like to work with practices that are keen to be 'early
adopters' of integrated communications. If you are one of those
practices that are particularly keen on use of an integrated communications
system, then we'd like you to join our Practice Partnership
Programme. We work with our Practice Partners to identify
the steps they need to take to become fully paperless and then
assist them to involve their clinical partners (hospitals, laboratories,
radiologists, specialists, ancillary services). This programme
is already underway and working well.
If you are keen to work closely with us to make your practice
paperless please let us know of your interest by contacting us
at enquiries@healthlink.net
or by phoning Geoff Sayer on 02 9501 4925.
|
|
|
HealthLink in a Nutshell
HealthLink is a specialist health sector communications company.
HealthLink has slightly more than 50 staff and offices in Auckland,
Sydney, Brisbane and Perth. More than 8,000 medical organisations
use HealthLink; 3,500 in New Zealand and 4,500 in Australia. HealthLink's
services are also used across the Pacific Islands and the company
is currently establishing a presence in Canada. HealthLink has
a toll free support desk which subscribers can call 10 hours a
day.
Recently HealthLink was named in an international study as having
provided the driving force behind New Zealand's leadership in
the field of integrated healthcare IT. The study, commissioned
by Canada Health InfoWay, analysed the use of IT within primary
healthcare in Australia, Austria, Denmark, England, Germany, the
Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Scotland and Sweden.
|
|
|
HealthLink Helps South Coast Pathology in the Illawarra
HealthLink and South Coast Pathology in the Illawarra region
of NSW have joined forces in delivering reliable and secure pathology
reports to GP and specialists. The two organizations have been
effective in transferring existing customers from legacy messaging
systems and connecting new referring practices to the HealthLink
system.
Nikki Thrift - Business Development Manager for South Coast Pathology
continues to receive positive feedback for an independent pathology
company to be using HealthLink and showing interest in assisting
practices in their information sharing needs while delivering
a high quality pathology service.
"HealthLink's installation, support and online monitoring
tools have increased the capacity for information delivery for
our business. I can now monitor issues relating to connectivity
and can troubleshoot on-site issues with greatly improved clarity.
We are committed to moving medical practices towards the bigger
picture and playing an active role in this for the mutual benefit
of all parties" Says Nikki.
|
|
|
What are General Practices' Top IM/IT Priorities?
People suggest many different things that Information Technology
(IT) and Information Management (IM) can do to improve general
practice. Improvements can yield practice efficiency, safer patient
care, better patient outcomes, more profitable/sustainable business
and more cost effective delivery of treatment. However, until
now no one has ever asked GPs and medical practices what they
believe are the most important innovations/enhancements that would
contribute to improving General Practice?
HealthLink's Market Development Manager Geoffrey Sayer is conducting
a survey (in conjunction with Pulse Magazine www.pulsemagazine.com.au).
The Survey is aimed to provide clear direction on what IT/IM end
users want industry, government and academia to concentrate their
efforts on to improve general practice for GPs, staff and patients.
To participate go to www.pulsemagazine.com.au
or request a PDF for faxing back by emailing geoff.sayer@healthlink.net.
The results will be provided to the National E-Health Transition
Authority (NEHTA), the RACGP, the AMA, the ADGP and other organizations.
|
|
|
HealthLink helps General Practices meet PIP IT/IM Incentive
Requirements
From November 2006, there will be two levels of activity recognised
under the PIP IM/IT Incentive, Basic and Enhanced. The following
has been sourced from: http://www.medicareaustralia.com.au/providers/incentives_allowances/pip.htm
- Tier 1 - Basic
The practice maintains electronic patient records, which include
clinical data on allergies/sensitivities for the majority of
active patients. In addition, the practice implements appropriate
information security measures (e.g. virus protection, firewall,
backup and recovery, access control and practice procedures/processes
to support/maintain appropriate information security). The practice
also uses appropriate security (e.g. encryption systems) when
patient information and/or clinical data are transferred electronically.
- Tier 2 - Enhanced
The practice qualifies for Tier 1 and uses electronic patient
records to record and store clinical information on patients,
including current and past major diagnoses and current medications
for the majority of active patients.
While there are 2 tiers to receiving incentives of particular
interest for HealthLink users is that they already meet the requirement
for Secure Electronic Communications in the Tier 1 - Basic category.
The PIP requirement has been designed to discourage practices
from relying on unencrypted email for the sending and receiving
of patient information. It is important to remember that any health
information must be treated securely. HealthLink's use of PKI
ensures that messages are only able to be opened by the intended
recipient and prevents third parties from accessing the information
in transit across the internet.
|
|
|
HL7 Messaging Helps HealthCare System to Deliver Accountable
Healthcare
HL7 (Health Level Seven) describes a messaging format that is
a set of Australian (and International) standards for sending
information across the healthcare system. Use of HL7 messaging
standards allows disparate computer systems to effectively "talk"
with each other as the standard is open (not proprietary - or
unique to a specific practice or organisation) and able to be
used by anyone. The strength of HL7 over other messaging standards
is that a full acknowledgement loop is generated.
Think about the way in which the traditional postal system works
with envelopes and stamps. You post a letter to a colleague about
a patient whose treatment you are working on together. You actually
don't know what happens next to that letter. Wouldn't it be good
if you knew that it had gotten into the intended recipient's postal
box? Wouldn't it be even better that you knew that the intended
recipient had actually opened and read your letter!
When you use an HL7 message an acknowledgement message
is returned to the sender when the message has been processed
by the recipient's patient management or clinical system. This
type of acknowledgement is called an application acknowledgement.
This therefore ensures that the message has been processed by
the clinician or practice staff member and that the necessary
clinical action can take place. The sender automatically receives
the acknowledgement message from the patient management system.
Less sophisticated messaging systems such as PIT (Pathology Information
Transfer) can only tell the sender that it has gotten to the "mail
box" - in most cases the practice's server. This is called
a transport acknowledgement. In our view, reliance on a transport
acknowledgement is insufficient to ensure that the messaging
is working effectively as you don't know if the message has actually
made it through to the practice's clinical system.
Use of HL7 ensures that important and confidential patient information
is not "lost in the post" or "lost in the ether".
HL7 messaging also allows receivers to import data in a structured
manner and clinical systems are being developed with greater use
of the information contained in the structured HL7 message to
improve use of electronic decision support systems.
HealthLink supports the Australian HL7 standards for:
- Pathology and Results (AS4700.2 HL7 2.3.1 Final); and
- Referral and Discharge Summary (AS4700.6 HL7 2.3.1 Final)
Furthermore, HealthLink's HL7 messaging system has been assessed
and accredited by Australian Healthcare Messaging Laboratory (AHML)
as conforming to Australian Standards.
|
|
|
Which Software packages will send specialist reports via HealthLink?
HealthLink assists software vendors, Hospital, Laboratory, Specialist,
Allied Health and GPs attempting to send or receive Australian
Standards compliant HL7 messages into GPs systems.
As new messaging requirement standards evolve or software is
upgraded, HealthLink undertakes testing of these software changes
in its software test lab. HealthLink's Virtual Laboratory runs
all key vendor software applications and in some cases multiple
versions. Test messages are sent between different clinical systems
for validation and error checking.
Currently the following specialist software can send a specialist
report from within the native application using HL7 messaging.
Specialist Software Capable of Sending Electronic Reports
through HealthLink
|
Product
|
Company
|
HL7
|
|
Best Practice
|
Best Practice
|
Yes
|
|
Genie
|
Genie
|
Yes
|
|
Incisive
|
Incisive
|
Yes
|
|
MedTech 32
|
MedTech
|
Yes
|
|
MedTech Mercury
|
MedTech
|
Yes
|
|
Practix
|
IBA
|
Yes
|
|
Profile
|
Intrahealth
|
Yes
|
|
VIP
|
Houston
|
Yes
|
|
|
|
|
If you would like to unsubscribe from this mailing list please
click here.
|
|
|
Secure