Minister of Health Donville Inniss speaking at the Commonwealth Business Council-CARICOM Ministers Summit at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre yesterday.
Health sector embraces ICTs
6/16/2009
By Janelle Riley-Thornhill
A CABINET subcommittee has been established to develop a comprehensive, purpose-driven Information Communication Tech-nology (ICT) Plan for Barbados.
This committee, Minister of Health Donville Inniss explained, represents the major economic sector inclusive of health and education and was created because Government recognised the need for a national approach to integrating ICT in its developmental programmes and strategies.
His comments came as he addressed a gathering for the Commonwealth Business Council-CARICOM Ministers Summit at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre yesterday morning, which included Ministers of Health and other high ranking health officials from throughout the region.
Moreover, he revealed that because of the specific ICT requirements for the health care sector and the existing integration of ICT in healthcare delivery, his ministry has already made significant headway in formulating an ICT policy through the work of an information management and information technology task force. This draft policy, Minister Inniss said, outlines the strategic vision for the provision of healthcare services that incorporates individualised care, best practices, performance improvement and management.
“It is envisioned that these services will be fully integrated within a secured comprehensive information system. Such a system will encompass current and emerging technologies and will be available and accessible to authorised healthcare providers across the country, both in the public and private sectors,” Inniss said.
He added that the ministry is in the process of preparing a ‘request for proposal’ for a tender for the integration of the health information system. This request, he said, would include detailed functional specifications of the various components of the system with modules for laboratories, pharmacies, patient registration, in addition to a primary care and hospital modules.
He further stated that the ministry is seeking to recruit an implementation manager, whose responsibility will be to oversee the implementation of the health information system.
“Significant progress has already been made in implementing a comprehensive ICT model within the local healthcare sector. A Wide Area Network has been put into operation in all eight polyclinics and one outpatient clinic. This facilitates integrated patient registration, immunisation tracking and record of patient visits,” Inniss noted.
The minister said that it is imperative that regional healthcare systems quickly embrace and utilise modern information technology if they are to become more cost effective and consistent in the delivery of excellent health care to their citizens and visitors and alike.
“Every island, every country is challenged to find adequate financing for the provision of decent health care for their citizens. Our annual exercise of seeking to justify to our finance ministries the need for a few more millions of dollars for the health sector can be a gruelling exercise for most Caribbean health ministries. In Barbados where approximately 15 per cent of our annual budget is spent on health care, you can well imagine the challenge in getting additional funding,” he noted.
Nevertheless, he said that with better management of our limited resources, the delivery of service can be improved.
