title: Information society in Czech healthcare 'starting point' to prognosis for the year 2013.
abstract: A prognosis of how the information society in health care will look like in 2013 must start from the current state of affairs at the given locality regarding healthcare management by public authorities including legislative, ICT technological levels and accessibility of professional knowledge in individual fields of medicine. It is presumed that after 10 years the influence of this 'starting point' will still persist and knowledge of the current state of affairs will be needed to positively but also negatively differentiates the prognosis [Health Care in the Information Society: A Prognosis for the Year 2013, in this issue] for individual localities, e.g. Germany versus neighbouring the Czech Republic. The present article focuses on aims of Czech health care and the measures that are taken in Czech health care that are carried out and which have been already initiated. Their significance towards the future prognosis according to [Health Care in the Information Society: A Prognosis for the Year 2013, in this issue] is clear. The first measure is legalisation of conditions, which allow health care administration only be carried out with electronic forms and the protection of these sensitive personal data when they are placed in a centralised data depository where they are prepared for physicians who use them while providing health care in health institutions. In the Czech Republic an information system is developed called Internet Access to Health Patient Information (IHPI). The second measure is creating a unified central system of health information together with methodologies for data collection, data standards and protocols. In the Czech Republic there is the National Health Information System (NHIS) governed by the Institute for Health Information and Statistics (IHIS CR). The NHIS enables care providers to get information about the health state of citizens, about health institutions, about their activities and economics, it enables to regulate the provision of health care, to define conceptions of state health politics and to administrate public health. The third measure is legalisation of possibilities to establish centralised health care registers that are designated for recording and following of patients with chosen socially serious diseases. These registers help with diagnosis and therapy and reveal consequences of diseases for the patients. It helps to evaluate accessibility and quality of provided health care in the country. An important goal of the use of health care registers and information systems is for educational purposes and as causal expert systems for physicians. The National Health Registers have been introduced to the whole of the Czech Republic; some of them are accessible on-line in a countrywide data network. The last part of the paper focuses on research and education for developing the information society in Czech health care and on co-operation with EU countries in selected projects and initiatives.
authors.affiliation: European Centre for Medical Informatics, Institute of Computer Science, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Pod Vodarenskou vezi 2, 182 07 Prague, Czech. zvarova@euromise.cz
authors.forename: Jana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zvárová
authors.forename: Vladimír
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Pribík
mesh_terms: D003199:Computer Systems; D018153:Czech Republic; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D005062:European Union; D005103:Expert Systems; D005544:Forecasting; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D007256:Information Systems; D020407:Internet; D008490:Medical Informatics; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized; D011379:Prognosis; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D012042:Registries; D012106:Research; D012984:Software