Industry Brief June 2010

Edition 1: June 2010

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Dear Visitor

Certification open
for debate

Update on
Healthcare Identifiers

Free messaging
workshops

Strategy targets national agenda

This year is a landmark in the development of Australia's national e-health infrastructure. The $466.7 million Budget go-ahead for our first Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record, along with pending legislation to introduce Healthcare Identifiers, demonstrate the commitment of the governments of Australia to reform the healthcare system.

The national Healthcare Identifiers Service has now been built and Release 3 testing is currently underway enabling operations to commence when the Healthcare Identifiers Bill is passed. These foundations will form the basis for other activities currently underway such as discharge summaries and referrals and a range of other e-health enhancements.

The information and communications technology industry has a unique role to play in delivering these innovations. While NEHTA is responsible for developing guidelines and specifications defining core elements of our national e-health infrastructure, it is the ICT industry that will take the vision to market through its products and services. NEHTA is not a software developer, rather it is the role of the private sector to take up the innovation challenge and deliver solutions to the market. More

Peter Fleming, CEO

Connect Icon Industry debate opens on
software certification

NEHTA is calling for industry comment on a new discussion paper which explores possible options for a national medical software certification program. The discussion paper is one of two new publications which describe NEHTA's approach to software testing and conformity assessment using a risk-based methodology designed to balance the cost and complexity of testing against the quality and safety benefits it offers to vendors, clinicians and patients.

The first document, CCA Assessment Concept of Operations describes the foundations of NEHTA’s methodology. It provides the context for any future certification program, the questions and options for which are outlined in a National E-Health Certification Capability Discussion Paper, which will be open for comment until the end of July 2010.

Have your say before 30 July 2010

Connect Icon Update on National Healthcare
Identifiers Service

Legislation currently before Federal Parliament is set to formalise the introduction of Australia’s national Healthcare Identifiers Service. In November 2009, NEHTA released the first in a series of technical specifications for software companies wishing to access the national numbering system.

In March 2010, the HI Service operator Medicare Australia published a second release and provided a platform for software vendors to begin testing the ability of their applications to connect with the HI Service.

The assessment and testing process itself is expected to be operated by established, independent industry bodies, such as NATA-accredited test laboratories, with vendors able to access this service by early 2011.

Third specification pending

Support for secure messaging developers

A series of free implementation workshops is being organised for software developers interested in learning more about the new Australian technical specifications for secure e-health messaging. The workshops are expected to be run in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane beginning in mid-July 2010. Architects and developers from NEHTA's Secure Messaging team will be on hand to assist commercial developers integrate web services into their software products.

NEHTA work plan in a nutshell

A new report from leading management consultants Booz and Company indicates that an effective health IT system in Australia would save 5,000 lives and reduce annual health costs by $7.6 billion. This is a compelling argument for the work of the National E-Health Transition Authority which is the lead organisation responsible for driving the design and implementation of Australia's national e-health infrastructure.

Strategy tackles four priorities

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