Information Systems
Medical information systems are a key tool for meeting existing and future organisational challenges faced by the Andalusian Public Health System and the demands of the different agents involved: managers, ICT managers, healthcare professionals and citizens, as the management and delivery of welfare services is part of a complex and interdependent environment. The health system is steadily accumulating more and more data and information which must be correctly processed and analysed.
The system needs to be flexible, specialised and efficient, both on an economic and operational level, and because of this the single, overall provider model is now obsolete and new challenges have arisen which require all agents involved to interact in an integrated and systematic way with other information systems in other areas of the health system. If this requirement is to be met, a firm, strategic commitment to interoperability and the incorporation of international standards for computer-based management of clinical and health information must be made.
Medical information systems can only be improved by strategic use of ICTs implementing the following lines of action: virtualisation, cloud computing, integration architecture, security, support, exploitation of information and decision-making support. This has formed the basis for creating the Living Lab Salud de Andalucia's Digital Laboratory for Healthcare.
The Digital Laboratory for Healthcare (LDS) provides a scenario for testing, integrating and demonstrating all kinds of health information system solutions using specific technological processes, putting forward an interoperabiilty model and applying the latest developments and clear future trends described above: virtualisation, cloud computing, etc. It can be said, therefore, that the LDS simplifies for healthcare centres the complex task of choosing information and communication technology (ICT) systems, guaranteeing interoperability between these and optimising the benefit-to-cost ratio.
The LDS provides powerful framework architecture which includes most of the concepts, systems, applications and communication networks related to a wide-ranging use of information systems, while focussing on the needs of health systems. It also includes a number of recommendations and interconnection interoperability criteria for different systems to achieve full synergy between information systems, also enabling secure information sharing and optimising end user perfomance.
By this means the LDS enables the coordination of projects anda initiatives currently underway in Living Lab Salud Andalusia and ensures that they get to the end user as fast and cheaply as possible. At the same time, it greatly facilitates for systems and technology companies the task of developing useful solutions for the Andalusian Public Health System.