The following release appeared a few days ago and an item on the release appeared in the Monday News here:
http://aushealthit.blogspot.com/2009/09/useful-and-interesting-health-it-news_13.html
General Practice Data Governance Council launches
10 September 2009
The peak general practice organisations have come together to form a new body to oversee the use of general practice data collected from participating practices.
General practice is a vital part of the health care system in Australia with 115 million GP consultations taking place annually. Computers are used by 98% of GPs for clinical purposes. The manner in which data is collected, stored and managed has to be agreed by the general practice community that has an understanding of the key drivers of privacy, confidentiality, safety, quality, ethics and accuracy. The use of this data for applications such as health service planning and research must be governed with respect and due diligence.
The first official meeting of The General Practice Data Governance Council was held on Friday, 28 August 2009, hosted by the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) and chaired by Dr Mukesh Haikerwal.
The meeting included representatives from the Australian Association of Practice Managers (AAPM), the Australian General Practice Network (AGPN), the Australian Medical Association (AMA), the Australian Practice Nurses Association (APNA) and the Rural Doctors Association Australia (RDAA). Council members identified and extended an invitation to the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM) and the Consumers Health Forum (CHF).
Dr Mukesh Haikerwal said the need for general practice to manage data generated as part of clinical practice is crucial and urgent. He was very pleased that the key general practice organisations were ready and willing to collaborate in this ground-breaking and vital work.
“There are many agencies that may want to access general practice data. We must ensure that this resource is used for the benefit of our patients and the quality of care they receive,” said Dr Haikerwal.
“Any collection of data in general practice needs to be mindful of patient privacy and confidentiality. We need to be assured of the security of practice data provided by GPs to other agencies. The medicolegal impacts of data sharing must be clarified. The General Practice Data Governance Council is committed to exploring these issues and developing profession led initiatives in these areas. This is a very exciting time for general practice,” said Dr Haikerwal.
The new group has been formed in response to the many data transfer activities currently planned or taking place in Australia , and the recent release of reports into health care reform from the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission.
The General Practice Data Governance Council intends to work closely with The National E-Health Transition Authority Limited (NEHTA) and the Safety and Quality Commission on key e-health issues in general practice.
The media release is found here:
http://www.racgp.org.au/media2009/34119
The questions that occurred to me is why now and what might the stimulus be for setting this up, given we have had GP computer use at quite high levels for many years.
In passing I note that there is no indication as to how this Council is to be funded and just who is going to fund it.
I also note that, as yet, we have not seen any minutes or statement from the Council other than this release saying we had a meeting a couple of weeks ago and here is who came.
I also find it fascinating that the Government is yet to respond to the NHHRC Final Report – which talked about forcing GPs and others to provide information to Personalised Health Records and that out of the blue, chaired by a former NHHRC Commissioner, we have this group emerge.
It is also interesting that the Consumer Health Forum was added to the list of attendees as what must be a bit of an afterthought, or so it seems.
If pushed I would suggest this is a DoHA push as they realise if the sharing of GP records with the consumers is to ever become more than a gleam in the NHHRC’s eye that there is a lot of work to do to sort out the governance, sharing and quality issues around the information which is presently held in those systems.
The RACCP has worked with Pen Computing to develop and promote software that can assist with data quality and clinical audit and so, having an interest in the area, it is logical they convene such a group.
I find it astounding, by the way, that the Australian Privacy Foundation (www.privacy.org.au) does not have a seat at the table given we are apparently specifically talking about the sharing of clinical information.
We all really need to keep an eye on this group and they really need to be pretty open in their discussions for the good of e-Health as a whole. They certainly are likely to need both privacy and legal expertise as they move forward. They may also want input from the team working on patient record information security in IT-14 from Standards Australia. (see tomorrow’s blog for more information on that area).
I suspect it will be a good while before we have the governance structures in place to ensure we have clinical information that is auditably ‘fit to share’.
Were I a GP I would be very curious to know who is funding this – as that may very well reveal some plans that are presently not all that obvious and which may have an impact on the way I practice that is not entirely cost or work free.
Other theories are more than welcome!
David.
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