Apparently We Are to Have Electronic Health Records From the Budget. Be Alert but Not Alarmed!

The following appeared as an apparent budget leak this morning.

Revealed: Rudd's $2b budget lure

PHILLIP COOREY CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT

May 7, 2010

EXCLUSIVE

ANOTHER $2 billion in health funding is expected to be revealed at Tuesday's federal budget to pay for changes to primary care, increase the number of nurses and the duties they perform, and to introduce a long-awaited system of electronic health records.

The money would be one of the few new spending measures in what is otherwise expected to be an austere, pre-election document. It takes the total expenditure on health measures allied to the federal government's proposed reform plan for hospitals to $7.4 billion.

The Herald understands most of the $2 billion will be dedicated to out-of-hospital services, or primary care. The government has promised to fund 100 per cent of primary care and GP services.

The changes will involve expanding the use and co-ordination of allied health professionals and integrating them with GPs. Nurses will be at the forefront, with more needed to staff the expanded out-of-hospital system.

The funding, spread over four years, would not include anything for the Denticare system proposed by the health and hospitals reform commission. It is believed this measure was considered too expensive.

Electronic health, or e-health, which will be funded, allows for the easier sharing of a patient's medical records by health professionals who would be able to view a privacy-protected database.

It allows for an easy transfer of records when a patients shifts residence or changes doctor.

More here:

http://www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/revealed-rudds-2b-budget-lure-20100506-uh2b.html

While we have yet to see any details the risk here is that we get another ‘out of the blue’ announcement like so many others we have seen which have been developed in secret and really do not reflect what might actually be needed or actually work.

We will all have wait and see, but given the Government’s track record on the ‘health reform’ to date I find it hard to be all that optimistic.

David.