This year, the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) took on a major challenge: organizing for the first time the Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition in Latin America. And to achieve this goal it formed a partnership with the Brazilian Association of Health CIOs (ABCIS).
André Almeida, the Technical Director of the Health Department of the Government of the State of Sao Paulo and President of ABCIS, believes that the ICT market is evolving rapidly and that the biggest regional challenge for Latin America is the effective implementation of the electronic health record (EHR) and that the disintegration of healthcare information will be the next challenge to be addressed.
What is your vision of the role that public policy and the private sector should play in the development of ICTs?
The great wall that used to exist between the public and private sectors is, in Brazil, getting lower and lower and at some point will cease to exist. It is important to note that although the wall is lower, institutions do not cooperate to build an informatics system that allows, regardless of whether the institution is public or private, sharing of information for the continuity of patient care.
In the healthcare model applied in Brazil, private health is a supplementary option to public healthcare, but there should be a more harmonized process between them both. Without a doubt, the role of public health is to establish patterns, to act to centralize decision-making, but all the decisions should be taken in a studious manner, taking into account the great diversity that exists in Brazil.
How does the gap between the public and private sectors affect the lack of integration of information?
I believe that this will be our next great challenge, at least here in Brazil. Every administrator knows that gap makes it difficult to plan, epidemiologically and administratively speaking. HIMSS, in this regard, has already released a tool that is being studied by several administrators to support the model of continuity in healthcare. This model is being designed with a focus on sharing information between care units.
What do you think of the EHR Model in the region?
Effective information is another major challenge. Here, the situation is an enormous disparity between different institutions and we also have significant difficulties closing the gap. In this regard, we are very pleased to see from the first studies of the EMRAM model, that, to our surprise, there are institutions that are candidates for Level 6 HIMSS.
What is your assessment of ICTs in Latin America?
The ICT market is evolving rapidly, especially ICTs focused on healthcare. I see the supply industry as being more and more focused on offering solutions that can provide added value to the existing business, as the old view; that it was necessary to undo what was being done before to provide something new, no longer applies.
A major local challenge is with infrastructure, which always means that the professional has to consider alternative contingency plans. The arrival of suppliers from other countries also pleases me; in addition to providing a fresh perspective, they encourage local companies to provide a higher level of technology.
What are the purposes of the HIMSS Latin America Conference?
We are very pleased to see the partnership between HIMSS and ABCIS. Our key goals are to promote EMRAM methodology and its benefits for hospital units.
We also want to showcase models for improvement, with professionals who have already gone through the stage of increasing maturity in the use of IT at their corporations sharing their experiences and explaining how the model could be adapted in Latin America.
And, finally, to have a place in which to exchange opinions and establish contacts, both with sector professionals and also the supplier industry, which is starting to see the health sector as an area with very specific demands and that is very demanding of its service providers.
What are ABCIS’s projects?
Our focus is always on people. Keeping professionals up to date with the challenges that are occurring across the world is one of our tasks; that way we will always be looking for new developments in the market that could make a direct difference to the professional’s work.
Another aspect that is always on our radar is helping professionals to support the decision-making processes of corporations.
Are you thinking of expanding the organization into other countries in Latin America?
At the present moment we are consolidating our regional units. Brazil is very large and has a very complex care network. Today we have regional units in Bahía, Pernambuco, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro, the south of Brazil and the interior of Sao Paulo.
As we always deal with supporting professionals in their main activity, we believe that for now the best model is to approach institutions with the same objective and to support other regions that have the will but are not aware of how to begin an association.
