Minister of Health speaks at the Ehealth Vietnam Summit 2020 (Photo: VNA)Hanoi (VNA) – The Ministry of Health launched a grassroots health information
management app, a social network, and an individual health record platform on
December 30 as part of its held in Hanoi.
The V20 app is expected to completely transform nearly
12,000 health clinics nationwide. Paperwork, which used to cost these
establishments 50 to 70 percent of their total working time for making reports,
will be managed on a single app starting January 2021.
The Vietnamese health network, the first social network of
the sector, meanwhile, aims to boost connection, sharing, and support the
training of more than 500,000 medical staff across the nation. The ministry
requires each upper-level doctor to make friends and assist four doctors at the
provincial level, four health workers at the district level and two health
workers at the commune level.
The platform, meanwhile, was built for a life-time management
of each person from the womb, birth, to death. It will link together the data
of all medical facilities involved and of the Vietnam Social Security in a bid
to form a national health treatment database.
“Digital transformation in the medical sector includes
the comprehensive application of information technology, with a special focus
on modern digital technologies, leading to a positive change in all medical
activities of the health sector. We do not set a target on quantity but the
main goal is to better serve the people, to access more convenient and
high-quality medical services,” said Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long
at the event.
Long said that despite having to fight the COVID-19
pandemic, the health sector still has made efforts in digital transformation
and has gained encouraging results in the past year.
In the administrative field, 100 percent of procedures were
provided with online public services at level 4, while 100 percent of documents
at the health ministry have been processed online and applied digital
signatures. The ministry will also operate an application for tracking the
progress and handling bottlenecks in processing.
“In the future, we commit to cut 30 percent of
administrative procedures to create better conditions for people and
businesses,” said Long.
In November, the Ministry of Health also launched the
medical public portal that publicises all medical services provided by the
health sector. At the moment, people can access and monitor over 62,000
pharmaceutical products, more than 17,000 pieces of medical equipment and
materials, more than 93,000 bidding results and prices for medical services
announced by more than 1,400 medical facilities.
In the near future, the health ministry will publicise all
retail pharmaceuticals and supplement food prices, helping people easily look
up drug prices and compare prices at stores for the most suitable choice.
Information technology has also contributed greatly to help Vietnam
control the pandemic. Vietnam is also one of the first countries to apply
electronic medical declarations, Bluezone tracing applications and COVID-19
safety maps.
“Up to now, Vietnam is one of the most successful nations in
the fight against COVID-19 using the most economical and effective
models,” said the Minister of Health.
Vietnam has launched a remote health examination and
treatment network with more than 1,500 medical facilities, helping patients at
lower levels access quality services by doctors of upper levels. By 2025, 100
percent of the country’s medical facilities will participate in the network,
including private health facilities.
Regarding personal electronic health records, the Ministry
of Health has cooperated with the Vietnam Social Security to establish nearly
98 million health records with 42 professional specialties for outpatients.
Electronic personal health records will be applied for all outpatients from
July next year, according to the minister.
“The goal of the health sector is to build a smart health
system. Health facilities spend time on medical examination and treatment, not
for procedures and paperwork,” added Long.
Deputy Prime Minister delivers a speech at the summit (Photo: VNA)
In his speech at the summit, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc
Dam praised the efforts of the Health Ministry and its collaboration with other
ministries and sectors in its IT application process.
He recommended the sector to promote innovative methods, pay
attention to a legal framework, policy and finance serving the work, and speed
up the building of an automatic health consultation system for people.
The development of remote health examination and treatment
as well as digital personal health records are also key tasks, Dam added.
Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung
said that his ministry committed to accompany the in the
digital transformation journey.
Vietnam has a strong force of digital technology businesses,
with nearly 60,000 businesses and over 1 million employees, ready to solve most
of the problems of the health sector, Hung said./.
Source: VietnamPlus
