Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 15 September 2021
623. Deputy Neasa Hourigan asked the Minister for Health the progress made in relation to the roll-out of eHealth initiatives as per the 2019 general practitioner agreement; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43377/21]
View answerGood progress has been made in relation to the rollout of eHealth initiatives since agreement was reached with GPs in 2019 on a wide range of contractual reform and service development. The pandemic has demonstrated not only the value of the eHealth initiatives that were specified within the contract, but also others, such as the transfer of prescriptions electronically between the GP practice and community pharmacy and the use of telehealth solutions (audio and video) to enable social distancing and reduce physical contact between patients and clinical staff, during times when the virus was most prevalent.
During the vaccination rollout, the HSE was able to accelerate the Individual Health Identifier (IHI) programme as a result of GPs providing the necessary identifying information for each person vaccinated within GP practices. This in turn will facilitate the practice systems themselves being populated with IHI numbers.
It was not possible to implement the full ePrescribing system during the pandemic. However, my department did introduce new regulations which facilitated the deployment of a solution for the safe electronic transfer of prescriptions, thus eliminating the need for paper-based prescriptions and for patients to visit GPs solely to collect repeat prescriptions.
Electronic referrals were used almost exclusively for Covid-19 tests. Whilst electronic referrals to NIMIS (National Integrated Medical Imaging System) could not be automated there was a general increase in the adoption of electronic referrals during this time, including through increased adoption of Healthlink, Healthmail and use of the PCRS electronic claims system by GPs before and since the pandemic.
Whilst progress by the HSE on the summary and shared care record programme was impacted during the pandemic, GPs remained committed and engaged in preparations for their introduction. The extensive engagement by GPs in the Covid vaccination programme also involved the widespread implementation of the associated vaccination systems.
