SA Health Professionals Sign up to Secure Messaging
Over 1200 South Australian health care providers will have access to secure electronic messaging giving GP’s and allied health professionals the ability to securely and electronically transfer clinical and patient data. Important communications such as referrals will arrive immediately, eliminating the staffing, printing and communication costs of mailed or faxed referrals.Only messages sent between secure networks remain secure. For that reason, the healthcare professionals who applied for a secure system then nominated their communication network. To be effective secure messaging needs to be installed at both ends. A network can be as small as a GP who communicates with a particular allied health provider.
Twelve hundred South Australian health professionals signed up to the secure messaging program following a marketing campaign. As part of the installation, all associated software costs are covered for the first year.
“The HealthConnect SA secure messaging project has acted as a catalyst for health providers in the western region to finally get motivated about using secure and efficient communication channels as opposed to the traditional fax, letter and email. Over the next 12 months we should really see the true benefits of electronic messaging as providers become comfortable with the technology and it becomes an integral part of their business operation,” commented a representative from the Adelaide Western GP Network
HealthConnect was set up three years ago by the Australian government to install secure messaging and broadband services. Each health professional is required to have a secure broadband connection before they are eligible for secure messaging. The government allocated $880,000 for secure broadband, split into grants of up to $3000 that were available to SA health care providers. The last of the secure broadband installations was rolled out by HealthConnect SA in August 2008.
“The secure messaging program has been a great success. It has allowed GPs, allied health workers and pharmacies to communicate more efficiently and effectively,” said the Adelaide Northern Division of General Practice.
Secure messaging is still in its infancy compared to the mobile phone network which allows people on different networks to communicate. For example, an Optus customer has no problem calling someone on the Telstra network. Healthcare providers need to have the same package in order to use secure messaging at the moment, however, the software is rapidly developing and this will soon change.
Improved communication between health care providers has many benefits for patients. Programs for the management of chronic disease, out of hospital care and risk factor identification can all be more effectively administered and with less paperwork, each practice has more time for their patients.
After all of the secure messaging packages have been rolled out, HealthConnect will then receive reports from health providers on usage levels. This will enable them to evaluate the success of the system on an ongoing basis.
“Shared health records will then be the next step and in the future, links will form between all the different systems. It’s all part of building the foundations of solid E-health,” said Scott Nell, the HealthConnect SA secure messaging manager.
HealthConnect SA is also managing the expansion of the Health Provider Registry to include allied health providers, as well as developing a web-based care planning system (e-Health Care Planning System). This care planning system will allow health care professionals to invite specialists such as podiatrists and dieticians to assist with the administering of the plan.
Part of the care planning system will be the Primary Care Sidebar. It will act as a communication and information hub, with data provided by the health care provider’s clinical software as each patient record is accessed. It will host a suite of clinical support tools to improve the quality of patient data, identify at risk patients and assist in the prevention and management of chronic disease.