English health care change

Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients,  May, 2004  by Jule Klotter

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The National Health Service (NHS) of England is spending $17 billion to develop and implement a nationwide computerized health care information system. Over the next couple of years, the health records of each of England's 50 million NHS clients will be stored in a central database, accessible to medical practitioners. The system will allow health care appointments and referrals to be made online. Doctors will also be able to e-mail prescriptions directly to pharmacies. The computerized system will also allow attending physicians, practitioners, and therapists to follow a patient's care over time and document when each phase of a person's treatment is scheduled to take place. Officials expect the system to conduct five billion transactions a year by the end of 2008.

To protect patient privacy, NHS is allowing patients to prevent general access to potentially damaging information (eg., an abortion or a mental health problem) and to designate which medical practitioners can see their complete medical records. The NHS system will also include an 'audit trail' that will show who has accessed which parts of a patient's record.

Naik, Gautam. England Plans Major Revamp of Health Care. The Wall Street Journal 3 December 2003

COPYRIGHT 2004 The Townsend Letter Group
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