Development of a Web-Portal Health Information System for Barangay

In the Philippines, a barangay is the smallest administrative unit serving as suburban neighborhoods' first line of defense. According to Bautista, barangays conduct a manual file-based process of storing the community's health information. Therefore, the need for a single platform enables a small government unit to manage its resources while being transparent to its community. The study aims to develop a web- based barangay health information system portal for Barangay 69 District 1 in Tondo Manila. The system would be a reference tool for barangays as their platform provides inventory management, the barangay's health programs, and a dashboard for data visualization inventory management, tracking of Covid cases, administration of health activities, and a dashboard for data visualization. As a result, the web portal is functional, and different test scenarios show above-average results. The study concludes that the system provided a platform for the barangay and its residents. It also concludes that it is user-friendly and efficiently disseminates the barangay's health programs and activities. © 2023 IEEE.

Integrating Telehealth for Strengthening Health Systems in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Perspective from Peru.

The COVID-19 pandemic forced the government to rapidly modify its legal framework to adopt telemedicine and promote the implementation of telehealth services to meet the healthcare needs of patients in Peru. In this paper, we aim to review the main changes to the regulatory framework and describe selected initiatives to promote the telehealth framework that emerged in Peru during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, we discuss the challenges to integrate telehealth services for strengthening health systems in Peru. The Peruvian telehealth regulatory framework began in 2005, and in subsequent years, laws and regulations were established that sought to progressively implement a national telehealth network. However, mainly local initiatives were deployed. In this sense, significant challenges remain to be addressed, such as infrastructure in healthcare centers, including high-speed Internet connectivity; infostructure of health-information systems, including interoperability with electronic medical records; monitoring and evaluation of the national agenda for the health sector in 2020-2025; expanding the healthcare workforce in terms of digital health; and developing the capacities of healthcare users on health literacy, including digital aspects. In addition, there is enormous potential for telemedicine as a key strategy to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic and to improve access to rural and hard-to-reach areas and populations. There is thus an urgent need to effectively implement an integrated national telehealth system to address sociocultural issues and strengthen the competencies of human resources in telehealth and digital health in Peru.

Health information systems evaluation criteria: Overview of systematic reviews

Introduction: Health information systems play an important role in improving the quality of patient care and patient safety. to ensure their effectiveness and efficiency, they need to be evaluated. Although HIS evaluation has been investigated in many studies, there is no consensus on which aspects of HIS to evaluate. The aim of this study is to identify the indicators for the evaluation of health information systems and to provide an overview of the criteria devised and studies conducted. Material and Methods: An umbrella review was performed exploring databases PubMed, Science direct, Web of Science, Science, and IEEE while following the PRISMA protocol. Articles were reviewed by two authors independently using the covidence tool to check the inclusion criteria and to extract the data items. Risk of bias was assessed using ROBIS and AMSTAR. Results: All included studies showed a high risk of bias according to ROBIS criteria. The extracted evaluation criteria were classified into 13 categories. Most of the studies believe that a more reliable and standardized tool is needed for the evaluation of health information systems. Two studies mentioned that surveys and questionnaires were the most commonly used method for evaluation of the systems. Summative evaluation was the most used method in two studies and the least used method in another one study. Conclusion: All the included studies had high risk of bias. Accordingly, further research and evidence is needed in this field. Most of the studies highlighted the need for more reliable and standardized tools for evaluation of health information systems. © 2022 Published by Frontiers in Health Informatics.

Innovations in clinical documentation integrity practice: Continual adaptation in a data-intensive healthcare organisation.

BACKGROUND: Numbers of clinical documentation integrity specialists (CDIS) and CDI programs have increased rapidly. CDIS review patient records concurrently with patient admissions and visits to ensure that information is accurate, complete and non-ambiguous, and query clinicians when they see opportunities for improving data. The occupation was initially focused on improving data for reimbursement, but rapid changes to clinical coding requirements, technologies and payment systems led to a quickly evolving role for CDI programs and changes in CDIS practice. OBJECTIVE: This case study seeks to uncover the ongoing innovation and adaptation occurring in a CDI program by tracing the evolution of a single CDI program over time. METHOD: We present a case study of the CDI program at the HonorHealth hospital system in Arizona. RESULTS: The HonorHealth CDI program holds a unique hybrid expertise and role within the healthcare organisation that allows it to rapidly adapt to support emergent demands both internal and external to the organisation, such as supporting accurate data collection for the COVID-19 pandemic. CONCLUSION: CDIS are a vital component in present data-intensive resourcing efforts. The hybrid expertise of CDIS and capacity for adaption and relationship building has enabled the HonorHealth CDI program to adapt rapidly to meet a growing array of clinical documentation integrity needs, including emergent needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. IMPLICATIONS: The HonorHealth case study can guide other CDI programs in adaptation of the CDI role and practices in response to changing organisational needs.

[Digital transformation for more equitable and sustainable public health in the age of digital interdependenceTransformação digital para uma saúde pública mais equitativa e sustentável na era da interdependência digital]. / La transformación digital para una salud pública más equitativa y sostenible en la era de la interdependencia digital.

This article describes eight guiding principles for the digital transformation of the health sector and identifies their relationship with the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as highlighting their importance to countries undergoing digital transformation processes. In the Region of the Americas, among other gaps, 30% of people do not have access to the Internet, which is why it is mandatory to develop policies and actions to deliver public health interventions equitably and sustainably to ensure that no one is left behind. The eight principles focus on the four areas of a sustainable health system - human, social, economic and environmental - and highlight the broader possibilities using digital technology to impact the sustainability of health systems.

Este artigo descreve oito princípios norteadores para a transformação digital do setor da saúde e identifica sua relação com a pandemia de COVID-19, além de destacar sua importância para os países que estão em processo de transformação digital. Na Região das Américas, entre outras lacunas, 30% das pessoas não têm acesso à Internet; portanto, é imprescindível desenvolver políticas e ações para realizar intervenções de saúde pública de maneira equitativa e sustentável, para assegurar que ninguém seja deixado para trás. Os oito princípios enfocam as quatro áreas de um sistema de saúde sustentável ­ humana, social, econômica e ambiental ­ e destacam possibilidades mais amplas do uso da tecnologia digital para impactar a sustentabilidade dos sistemas de saúde.

Small area population denominators for improved disease surveillance and response.

The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the value of strong surveillance systems in supporting our abilities to respond rapidly and effectively in mitigating the impacts of infectious diseases. A cornerstone of such systems is basic subnational scale data on populations and their demographics, which enable the scale of outbreaks to be assessed, risk to specific groups to be determined and appropriate interventions to be designed. Ongoing weaknesses and gaps in such data have however been highlighted by the pandemic. These can include outdated or inaccurate census data and a lack of administrative and registry systems to update numbers, particularly in low and middle income settings. Efforts to design and implement globally consistent geospatial modelling methods for the production of small area demographic data that can be flexibly integrated into health-focussed surveillance and information systems have been made, but these often remain based on outdated population data or uncertain projections. In recent years, efforts have been made to capitalise on advances in computing power, satellite imagery and new forms of digital data to construct methods for estimating small area population distributions across national and regional scales in the absence of full enumeration. These are starting to be used to complement more traditional data collection approaches, especially in the delivery of health interventions, but barriers remain to their widespread adoption and use in disease surveillance and response. Here an overview of these approaches is presented, together with discussion of future directions and needs.

Assessing the Immunization Information System and electronic health record interface accuracy for COVID-19 vaccinations.

Objective: Our objective is to assess the accuracy of the COVID-19 vaccination status within the electronic health record (EHR) for a panel of patients in a primary care practice when manual queries of the state immunization databases are required to access outside immunization records. Materials and Methods: This study evaluated COVID-19 vaccination status of adult primary care patients within a university-based health system EHR by manually querying the Kansas and Missouri Immunization Information Systems. Results: A manual query of the local Immunization Information Systems for 4114 adult patients with "unknown" vaccination status showed 44% of the patients were previously vaccinated. Attempts to assess the comprehensiveness of the Immunization Information Systems were hampered by incomplete documentation in the chart and poor response to patient outreach. Conclusions: When the interface between the patient chart and the local Immunization Information System depends on a manual query for the transfer of data, the COVID-19 vaccination status for a panel of patients is often inaccurate.

For-profit versus non-profit cybersecurity posture: breach types and locations in healthcare organisations.

BACKGROUND: The implementation of emerging technologies has resulted in an increase of data breaches in healthcare organisations, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Health information and cybersecurity managers need to understand if, and to what extent, breach types and locations are associated with their organisation's business type. OBJECTIVE: To investigate if breach type and breach location are associated with business type, and if so, investigate how these factors affect information systems and protected health information in for-profit versus non-profit organisations. METHOD: The quantitative study was performed using chi-square tests for association and post-hoc comparison of column proportions analysis on an archival data set of reported healthcare data breaches from 2020 to 2022. Data from the Department of Health and Human Services website was retrieved and each organisation classified as for-profit or non-profit. RESULTS: For-profit organisations experienced a significantly higher number of breaches due to theft, and non-profit organisations experienced a significantly higher number of breaches due to unauthorised access. Furthermore, the number of breaches that occurred on laptops and paper/films was significantly higher in for-profit organisations. CONCLUSION: While the threat level of hacking techniques is the same in for-profit and non-profit organisations, certain breach types are more likely to occur within specific breach locations based on the organisation's business type. To protect the privacy and security of medical information, health information and cybersecurity managers need to align with industry-leading frameworks and controls to prevent specific breach types that occur in specific locations within their environments.

Spatiotemporal risk assessment and COVID-19 trend estimation in a federative unit in northeastern Brazil.

BACKGROUND: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has spread worldwide, causing a high burden of morbidity and mortality, and has affected the various health service systems in the world, demanding disease monitoring and control strategies. The objective of this study was to identify risk areas using spatiotemporal models and determine the COVID-19 time trend in a federative unit of northeastern Brazil. METHODS: An ecological study using spatial analysis techniques and time series was carried out in the state of Maranhão, Brazil. All new cases of COVID-19 registered in the state from March 2020 to August 2021 were included. Incidence rates were calculated and spatially distributed by area, while the spatiotemporal risk territories were identified using scan statistics. The COVID-19 time trend was determined using Prais-Winsten regressions. RESULTS: Four spatiotemporal clusters with high relative risks for the disease were identified in seven health regions located in the southwest/northwest, north and east of Maranhão. The COVID-19 time trend was stable during the analysed period, with higher rates in the regions of Santa Inês in the first and second waves and Balsas in the second wave. CONCLUSIONS: The heterogeneously distributed spatiotemporal risk areas and the stable COVID-19 time trend can assist in the management of health systems and services, facilitating the planning and implementation of actions toward the mitigation, surveillance and control of the disease.

Are Health Information Systems Ready for the Digital Transformation in Portugal? Challenges and Future Perspectives.

PURPOSE: This study aimed to reflect on the challenges of Health Information Systems in Portugal at a time when technologies enable the creation of new approaches and models for care provision, as well as to identify scenarios that may characterize this practice in the future. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH: A guiding research model was created based on an empirical study that was conducted using a qualitative method that integrated content analysis of strategic documents and semi-structured interviews with a sample of fourteen key actors in the health sector. FINDINGS: Results pointed to the existence of emerging technologies that may promote the development of Health Information Systems oriented to "health and well-being" in a preventive model logic and reinforce the social and management implications. ORIGINALITY/VALUE: The originality of this work resided in the empirical study carried out, which allowed us to analyze how the various actors look at the present and the future of Health Information Systems. There is also a lack of studies addressing this subject. RESEARCH LIMITATIONS/IMPLICATIONS: The main limitations resulted from a low, although representative, number of interviews and the fact that the interviews took place before the pandemic, so the digital transformation that was promoted was not reflected. Managerial implications and social implications: The study highlighted the need for greater commitment from decision makers, managers, healthcare providers, and citizens toward achieving improved digital literacy and health. Decision makers and managers must also agree on strategies to accelerate existing strategic plans and avoid their implementation at different paces.

Characteristics and specifications of dashboards developed for the COVID-19 pandemic: a scoping review.

Aim: The use of information-based solutions such as dashboards is on the rise for taking fact-based actions against the COVID-19 crisis. This scoping review aimed to comprehensively investigate COVID-19 dashboards from different technical perspectives. Subject and methods: Three main bibliographic databases, PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus, were searched on 28 August 2021 to retrieve relevant studies. Arksey and O'Malley's (Int J Soc Res Methodol 8(1):19-32, 2005) methodological framework and the enhanced version of this methodology developed by Levac et al. (Implement Sci 5(1):1-9, 2010) were adopted for conducting this review. Results: In total, 26 articles were included. The COVID-19 dashboards mainly focused on the infected (n = 25), deceased (n = 17), and recovered cases (n = 13), as well as the performed test (n = 10). Most of the dashboards were interactive, with public accessibility targeting various user groups. While some dashboards were both informative and supportive (38%), most were mainly informative (92%). The dashboard data were generally analyzed using simple techniques (58%) and delivered through web-based applications (88%). Conclusion: Dashboards can help immediately manage, analyze, and summarize a huge amount of information about a COVID-19 outbreak. The findings revealed that the developed COVID-19 dashboards share more or less analogous characteristics that could lay the groundwork for designing and developing dashboards for any other pandemic.

Tracking health system performance in times of crisis using routine health data: lessons learned from a multicountry consortium.

COVID-19 has prompted the use of readily available administrative data to track health system performance in times of crisis and to monitor disruptions in essential healthcare services. In this commentary we describe our experience working with these data and lessons learned across countries. Since April 2020, the Quality Evidence for Health System Transformation (QuEST) network has used administrative data and routine health information systems (RHIS) to assess health system performance during COVID-19 in Chile, Ethiopia, Ghana, Haiti, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Mexico, Nepal, South Africa, Republic of Korea and Thailand. We compiled a large set of indicators related to common health conditions for the purpose of multicountry comparisons. The study compiled 73 indicators. A total of 43% of the indicators compiled pertained to reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health (RMNCH). Only 12% of the indicators were related to hypertension, diabetes or cancer care. We also found few indicators related to mental health services and outcomes within these data systems. Moreover, 72% of the indicators compiled were related to volume of services delivered, 18% to health outcomes and only 10% to the quality of processes of care. While several datasets were complete or near-complete censuses of all health facilities in the country, others excluded some facility types or population groups. In some countries, RHIS did not capture services delivered through non-visit or nonconventional care during COVID-19, such as telemedicine. We propose the following recommendations to improve the analysis of administrative and RHIS data to track health system performance in times of crisis: ensure the scope of health conditions covered is aligned with the burden of disease, increase the number of indicators related to quality of care and health outcomes; incorporate data on nonconventional care such as telehealth; continue improving data quality and expand reporting from private sector facilities; move towards collecting patient-level data through electronic health records to facilitate quality-of-care assessment and equity analyses; implement more resilient and standardized health information technologies; reduce delays and loosen restrictions for researchers to access the data; complement routine data with patient-reported data; and employ mixed methods to better understand the underlying causes of service disruptions.

Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on notifiable diseases in Northern Brazil / Impacto da COVID-19 em doenças de notificação compulsória no Norte do Brasil / Impacto de la COVID-19 en las enfermedades de notificación compulsoria del Norte de Brasil

Objetivo: Avaliar o impacto da pandemia COVID-19 em doenças de notificação compulsória no Norte do Brasil. Métodos: Estudo descritivo e retrospectivo realizado com dados das bases Sinan (Sistema de Informação de Agravos de Notificação) e SIH/SUS (Sistema de Informações Hospitalares do SUS) sobre meningite bacteriana e viral, dengue, febre hemorrágica da dengue, arboviroses, sífilis, tuberculose, hanseníase e hepatites virais. Utilizou-se estatística descritiva para avaliação da variação nos números absolutos das notificações e internações do período de 2015 a 2020 e suas variações médias. Resultados: As notificações e internações de meningite, arboviroses não-dengue, hanseníase, leptospirose e hepatites virais, em geral, demonstraram redução de 50 até 80% em relação a períodos anteriores. Houve variabilidade regional com dengue e febre hemorrágica da dengue, com aumentos e reduções independentes. As sífilis adquirida, gestacional e congênita demonstraram queda de até 60% nas notificações e nas internações, exceto sífilis congênita, que se manteve em estabilidade. As notificações e as internações de tuberculose se mantiveram estáveis em toda a região. Conclusão: Houve redução geral de mais da metade das notificações e das internações hospitalares, apresentando um impacto variável, dependendo do Estado e do processo de endemia de cada sub-região.

Objective: To assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on notifiable diseases in Northern Brazil. Methods: A descriptive retrospective study was conducted using data from the Notifiable Disease Information System (Sistema de Informação de Agravos de Notificação ­ Sinan) and SUS Hospital Information System (Sistema de Informações Hospitalares do SUS ­ SIH/SUS) on bacterial and viral meningitis, dengue, dengue hemorrhagic fever, arboviruses, syphilis, tuberculosis, leprosy, and viral hepatitis. Descriptive statistics was used to assess the variation in absolute numbers of notifications and hospitalizations from 2015 to 2020 and their average variations. Results: Notifications and hospitalizations for meningitis, non-dengue arboviruses, leprosy, leptospirosis, and viral hepatitis exhibited a general decrease of 50 to 80% compared to previous years. There was regional variation in dengue and dengue hemorrhagic fever, with independent increases and decreases. Acquired, gestational and congenital syphilis presented a 60% decrease in notifications and hospitalizations, except for congenital syphilis, which remained stable. Tuberculosis notifications and hospitalizations remained stable in the entire region. Conclusion: There was an overall decrease of more than a half of notifications and hospitalizations, representing a variable impact depending on the state and the endemic process of each subregion.

Objetivo: Evaluar el impacto de la pandemia de la COVID-19 en las enfermedades de notificación compulsoria del Norte de Brasil. Métodos: Estudio descriptivo y retrospectivo realizado con datos de las bases SINAN (Sistema de Información de Agravios de Notificación) y SIH/SUS (Sistema de Informaciones Hospitalarias del SUS) sobre la meningitis bacteriana y viral, el dengue, la fiebre hemorrágica del dengue, las arbovirosis, la sífilis, la tuberculosis, la lepra y las hepatitis virales. Se utilizó de la estadística descriptiva para la evaluación de la variación de los números absolutos de las notificaciones y los ingresos del periodo entre 2015 y 2020 y sus variaciones medias. Resultados: Las notificaciones y los ingresos de meningitis, arbovirosis no-dengue,la lepra, la leptospirosis y las hepatitis virales, en general, han demostrado una disminución del 50 hasta el 80% respecto los periodos anteriores. Hubo variabilidad por región respecto el dengue y fiebre hemorrágica del dengue con subidas y bajadas independientes. Las sífilis adquirida, gestacional y congénita han demostrado caída hasta el 60% de las notificaciones e ingresos excepto la sífilis congénita que se mantuvo estable. Las notificaciones y los ingresos por tuberculosis se mantuvieron estables em toda la región. Conclusión: Hubo una disminución general de más de la mitad de las notificaciones y los ingresos hospitalarios, presentando un impacto variable, a depender del Estado y del proceso de endemia de cada sub-región.

Leveraging PEPFAR-Supported Health Information Systems for COVID-19 Pandemic Response.

Since 2003, the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) has supported implementation and maintenance of health information systems for HIV/AIDS and related diseases, such as tuberculosis, in numerous countries. As the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, several countries conducted rapid assessments and enhanced existing PEPFAR-funded HIV and national health information systems to support COVID-19 surveillance data collection, analysis, visualization, and reporting needs. We describe efforts at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, and CDC country offices that enhanced existing health information systems in support COVID-19 pandemic response. We describe CDC activities in Haiti as an illustration of efforts in PEPFAR countries. We also describe how investments used to establish and maintain standards-based health information systems in resource-constrained settings can have positive effects on health systems beyond their original scope.

Blockchain-based Electronic Healthcare Information System Optimized for Developing Countries

Healthcare is the most crucial sector in people’s life. Many applications and systems have been proposed to improve the healthcare area. The outbreak of the novel coronavirus Covid19 turns more focus on healthcare applications. To manage medical data, healthcare professionals in developed countries have adopted several electronic healthcare information systems and technologies in recent years. However, these technologies show serious privacy risks and security issues, especially in the transfer of data and the recording of data transactions. Furthermore, the high cost of these technologies acquisition, as well as the complexity of their management, make their application in underdeveloped nations extremely problematic. This article proposes a solution based on a decentralized Blockchain architecture to reinforce the security of health information systems. This solution is particularly recommended for developing countries which lack high-tech infrastructures and suffer from poor interoperability between existing information systems. Various researches and works that implement blockchainbased solutions in the security of electronic health information systems (eHIS) are discussed in this article. A new approach based on a hyperledger fabric, implementing smart contracts and several other components is proposed. The suggested architecture involves many actors who can interact with medical records such as patients, doctors, pharmacists, laboratories and insurance companies. Data privacy is guaranteed because there is minimal risk of unauthorized access entities, and by design, the smart contract is the sole way to manipulate participant data. Various optimization and measurement experiments were carried on. The results covering various key parameters of system performance such as throughput, latency, CPU usage, memory consumption and network usage are presented © 2022,IAENG International Journal of Computer Science.All Rights Reserved

Digital Transformation of Information Fulfillment and Patient Engagement for Health Service Safety

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed hospital organizations to digitally transform in providing health services to patients. Health information systems and integrated electronic medical records must be empowered as a means of communication and providing information to patients, increasing patient involvement and collaboration with health practitioners in hospitals. We adopt a conceptual approach that aims to gain an understanding of digital transformation in facilitating information availability and patient engagement in healthcare. We have explored important extant studies to capture the roots and dynamics at the base of the diffusion of patient-centered healthcare innovations. The results show that eight knowledge-based aspects of digital transformation and the patient-centered healthcare ecosystem form the basis of the proposed conceptual framework, namely: patient and family involvement, information availability, interaction between systems, Omnichannel devices, cloud utilization, information security, and patient privacy, value creation, and patient safety. This research has implications in the form of value creation as a continuous innovation process in the organizational structure of the hospital and patient safety as a benefit that is felt directly by hospital customers. © 2022 ACM.

Health Information Systems Adaptation and Flexibility in Extreme Situations: The COVID Effect.

In 2020, a pandemic forced the entire world to adapt to a new scenario. The objective of this study was to know how Health Information Systems were adapted driven by the pandemic of COVID. 12 CIOS of healthcare organizations were interviewed and the interviews were classified according to the dimensions of a sociotechnical model: Infrastructure, Clinical Content, Human Computer Interface, People, Workflow and Communication, Organizational Characteristics and Internal Policies, Regulations, and Measurement and Monitoring. Adaptation to the Pandemic involved social, organizational and cultural rather than merely technical aspects in private organizations with mature and stable Health Information Systems.

Small area population denominators for improved disease surveillance and response.

The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the value of strong surveillance systems in supporting our abilities to respond rapidly and effectively in mitigating the impacts of infectious diseases. A cornerstone of such systems is basic subnational scale data on populations and their demographics, which enable the scale of outbreaks to be assessed, risk to specific groups to be determined and appropriate interventions to be designed. Ongoing weaknesses and gaps in such data have however been highlighted by the pandemic. These can include outdated or inaccurate census data and a lack of administrative and registry systems to update numbers, particularly in low and middle income settings. Efforts to design and implement globally consistent geospatial modelling methods for the production of small area demographic data that can be flexibly integrated into health-focussed surveillance and information systems have been made, but these often remain based on outdated population data or uncertain projections. In recent years, efforts have been made to capitalise on advances in computing power, satellite imagery and new forms of digital data to construct methods for estimating small area population distributions across national and regional scales in the absence of full enumeration. These are starting to be used to complement more traditional data collection approaches, especially in the delivery of health interventions, but barriers remain to their widespread adoption and use in disease surveillance and response. Here an overview of these approaches is presented, together with discussion of future directions and needs.

Improving Adult Immunization Rates Within Racial and Ethnic Minority Communities

Part 1: Quality Improvement, Recommended Vaccines, and Reducing Vaccine Disparities SUPPLEMENT SPONSOR: AMERICAN ACADEMY OF FAMILY PHYSICIANS This project is funded by a grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

The InfAct proposal for a sustainable European health information infrastructure on population health: the Distributed Infrastructure on Population Health (DIPoH).

BACKGROUND: In Europe, data on population health is fragmented, difficult to access, project-based and prone to health information inequalities in terms of availability, accessibility and especially in quality between and within countries. This situation is further exacerbated and exposed by the recent COVID-19 pandemic. The Joint Action on Health Information (InfAct) that builds on previous works of the BRIDGE Health project, carried out collaborative action to set up a sustainable infrastructure for health information in the European Union (EU). The aim of this paper is to present InfAct's proposal for a sustainable research infrastructure, the Distributed Infrastructure on Population Health (DIPoH), which includes the setup of a Health Information Portal on population health to be maintained beyond InfAct's time span. METHODS: The strategy for the proposal was based on three components: scientific initiatives and proposals to improve Health Information Systems (HIS), exploration of technical acceptability and feasibility, and finally obtaining high-level political support.. The technical exploration (Technical Dialogues-TD) was assumed by technical experts proposed by the countries, and political guidance was provided by the Assembly of Members (AoM), which gathered representatives from Ministries of Health and Science of EU/EEA countries. The results from the AoM and the TD were integrated in the sustainability plan compiling all the major outputs of InfAct. RESULTS: The InfAct sustainability plan was organized in three main sections: a proposal of a new research infrastructure on population health (the DIPoH), new health information tools and innovative proposals for HIS, and a comprehensive capacity building programme. These activities were carried out in InfAct and are being further developed in the Population Health Information Research Infrastructure (PHIRI). PHIRI is a practical rollout of DIPoH facilitating and generating the best available evidence for research on health and wellbeing of populations as impacted by COVID-19. CONCLUSIONS: The sustainability plan received wide support from Member States and was recognized to have an added value at EU level. Nevertheless, there were several aspects which still need to be considered for the near future such as: (i) a commitment of stable financial and political support by Member States (MSs), (ii) the availability of resources at regional, national and European level to deal with innovations, and (iii) a more direct involvement from EU and international institutions such as the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development OECD for providing support and sustainable contributions.