ABSTRACT
In order to improve the quality of patient care, while at the same time keeping up with the pace of increased needs of the population for healthcare services that directly impacts on the cost of care delivery processes, the Republic of Croatia, under the leadership of the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, has formed a strategy and campaign for national public healthcare system reform. The strategy is very comprehensive and addresses all niches of care delivery processes; it is founded on the enterprise information systems that will aim to support end-to-end business processes in the healthcare domain. Two major requirements are in focus: (1) to provide efficient healthcare-related data management in support of decision-making processes; (2) to support a continuous process of healthcare resource spending optimisation. The first project is the Integrated Healthcare Information System (IHCIS) on the primary care level; this encompasses the integration of all primary point-of-care facilities and subjects with the Croatian Institute for Health Insurance and Croatian National Institute of Public Health. In years to come, IHCIS will serve as the main integration platform for connecting all other stakeholders and levels of health care (that is, hospitals, pharmacies, laboratories) into a single enterprise healthcare network. This article gives an overview of Croatian public healthcare system strategy aims and goals, and focuses on properties and characteristics of the primary care project implementation that started in 2003; it achieved a major milestone in early 2007 - the official grand opening of the project with 350 GPs already fully connected to the integrated healthcare information infrastructure based on the IHCIS solution.
Subject(s)
Delivery of Health Care , Health Policy , Information Systems/standards , Medical Records Systems, Computerized/trends , CroatiaABSTRACT
Basic information is provided on the informatics system at the Croatian Institute of Health Insurance (CIHI). The focus is on the newwork infrastructure, which connects 130 locations 24 hours on line and installed hardware and software equipment at CIHI. A modern network infrastructure makes technical basis of modern informatics system. Technical data on the safe and reliable communication system with FR telecommunication capacity are presented. UNIX servers at the headquaters and branch offices, INFORMIX database and the own application ZOROH provide a basis for core business. Active Directory, web pages www.hzzo-net.hr, Intranet and CIHI IT portal are the main parts of the modern CIHI office info subsystem. Basic information is given about the system for production and.distribution of health insurance cards--plastic cards with magnetic strip for basic and additional health insurance. Informatics Department of CIHI has issued more than 13,000,000 basic health insurance cards and over 1,500,000 additional health insurance cards. Data storage and reporting system as part of the CIHI informatics system is essential for analyzing and planning health insurance business. CIHI IT has created a modern reporting system with: (a) superior performance and power of analytical and reporting possibilities; (b) scalable and flexible platform; (c) proactive reporting (Web, SMS, WAP, e-mail, fax, voice); (d) web interface for users. The presentation is concluded with basic information on the current projects such as introduction of digital signature in CIHI and plans for the introduction of smart cards instead of plastic cards with magnetic strip. Today, CIHI IT plays the major role in the process of health system computerization in Croatia. CIHI is technically and personnel equipped for computerization of the entire health system. The informatics system of CIHI can serve as a backbone for the informatics health system in the future.
