Slovene smart card and IP based health-care information system infrastructure.

Slovenia initiated a nation-wide project to introduce smart cards in the health sector in 1995 and its full-scale deployment started in September 2000. Although the basic aim of the project was to support insurance related procedures, the system was designed in a flexible and open manner to present an infrastructure for the whole health sector. The functionality of the current system is described in this paper along with lessons learned so far. The upgrade of the system is outlined, with emphasis on technical details, the objective being to provide a real-time EDI based environment for a general set of applications in the medical sector, supported by the flexibility and security of modern smart card technologies. Integration with similar systems in other EU countries is discussed.

The card integrated into the Slovene Health Care Information System.

At the time of the congress, the health insurance card system national scale introduction in Slovenia is completed. This paper presents the main features of the implementation process and of the resulting system. In its first phase configuration, the system addresses administrative tasks in the health care and health insurance sectors. Yet, technological and organisational infrastructure introduced, as well as experiences gained, provide sound grounds for the system enhancement with new functions, the development of which has been carried out in parallel with the basic system implementation. Furthermore, the system is designed to be open to the integration into the overall health care information system and to be a component of the continuous process of bringing the health care to the citizens.

Smartcard--a vehicle of access to the health care services.

This paper presents an outline of the Slovenian national project of introduction of the health insurance card system: the background, the grounds for its launching and benefits anticipated, system design, project phases, and interoperability with international healthcard systems. The system promises to simplify appreciably the administrative procedures currently required in the patient's daily encounters with the health care system, to benefit both the patient, the health care professionals and the insurance providers; as well as to provide the health care professionals with a new tool of accessing the networked information technology resources. In addition, the system cost-benefit analyses indicate significant economic benefits, which is a significant contribution to the containment of health care service. In the present environment of trans-border mobility, the significance of international interoperability of any social service system is equally significant as its internal efficiency. Consequently, the issues of compliance to international technology and interoperability standards have been assigned the same high priority as the issues of technological features of the proposed solution in the system design and implementation phase.

Introducing cards into Slovenian health insurance and health care.

This paper presents an outline of the Slovenian project of introducing card systems into health insurance and health care: bases for its launching; scope, system design, development phases, benefits, and issues of interoperability with the other card systems. The card system will induce distinct simplifications of the procedures now performed in the health care system, improve the quality of medical administrative services to the patients. The introduction of the card technology is under way in several European countries. With the Health insurance card system project, Slovenia is joining the EU projects, and can either test in practice and implement the concepts, as well as contributes particular original solutions.