Digitalising health systems involves introducing a cultural change, but the work is worthwhile – and Slovenia is a prime example, now with a healthcare system that’s gone from fragmented digital support to comprehensive integration Digitalising Slovenia’s healthcare system
Interview with Kerstin Vesna Petrič, head, Office for Cooperation with WHO, and Alenka Kolar, director-general, Directorate for the Digitalization in Healthcare, Ministry of Health Slovenia, and Hajdi Kosednar, eHealth Manager, Centre for Healthcare Informatics, Public Health Institute of Slovenia
T he digitalisation of health systems is about introducing a cultural change: it requires political determination, strong leadership, the engagement of different stakeholders, a good plan and effective communication to ensure acceptance and consensus. Apart from sufficient investments, governance is crucial for implementation. To sustain the change, long-term adjustments based on monitoring and evaluation are needed, as is ownership of the change. In Slovenia, it took us quite some time to meet these criteria. After years of fragmented and project-based approaches, the digital transformation in health care has become a key political priority. We have started on a journey that will increase the accessibility of high-quality services for our patients, reduce the administrative burden on health workers and speed up development in many fields of health care, as well as shift from fragmented digital support to its comprehensive integration in health care. Our general success in implementing innovative eHealth
solutions in Slovenia was recognised by the European Commission. The Digital Economy and Society Index Report placed Slovenia in sixth place in eHealth Services for 2017. For this article I have engaged in a conversation with two of my colleagues, Alenka Kolar and Hajdi Kosednar. What are the key advances Slovenia has made in accelerating and integrating the use of digital technologies in health care? Alenka Kolar: To accelerate the digital transformation in health care, leadership is important. We created a new directorate within the ministry of health to be responsible for digitalisation. For the sake of transparency, ownership and a coordinated approach, we developed a new digitalisation strategy based on a well-organised process and involved all stakeholders. In addition, comprehensive legislation has been presented to parliament this year to create a digital environment that would focus primarily on the patient and their needs. One of the goals of this new legislation is to ensure that health data is recorded
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Health: A Political Choice – From Fragmentation to Integration
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