Bringing health information exchange to the Middle East and North Africa: the case of Malaffi in Abu Dhabi

ABSTRACT

Launched in 2019, Malaffi is the first health information exchange (HIE) platform in the Middle East and North Africa region. It safely and securely connects public and private healthcare providers in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. Malaffi allows for meaningful, real-time exchange of patient health information between the providers, establishing a centralized database of unified patient records, thus improving healthcare quality and patient outcomes. Now that the foundation has been firmly established by collating 99% of all patient episodes in the Emirate, Malaffi is implementing tools to support population health. Recently these activities were focused on COVID-19 response. In the future, these population health services will offer insights to improve care delivery. This case study demonstrates the HIE status in the UAE and focuses on the establishment of Malaffi in Abu Dhabi. © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.