Interoperability Improves Patient’s Experience, Reduces Costs

Interoperability uses technology to exchange information for the improvement of different sectors. In healthcare, it can transform the patient’s experience, provide continuity in medical care, reduce costs and integrate health systems. Although efforts have been made in Mexico to leverage interoperability, the lack of a solid legal framework and technological preparedness is hampering its adoption among the health sector.

“Interoperability can guarantee sectorial co-participation between the public and private sectors, which would guarantee the improvement of patient care and break segmentation paradigms. This would help improve the quality and safety of patient care throughout their lives,” said Agustín López Rivadeneyra, Business Development Director, Dedalus.

The concept of interoperability appeared in the 1990s and refers to the ability to exchange information through technological components. The term has evolved to include coordination within the boundaries of an organization to cooperate in the use and transfer of data among stakeholders, allowing care providers to optimize the provision of healthcare services to individuals and populations.

This concept goes beyond a legal and technology issue. One must not lose sight of the fact that interoperability in the health system does not have a technological objective; it mainly seeks to improve health services. Interoperability involves technical, semantic, legal and human aspects. The technical aspect involves the establishment of standards and the classification of illnesses and hospital admissions. The semantic part refers to the ability to safeguard the information that is exchanged so that it can be used in any system. Meanwhile, the legal side of interoperability considers the institutional application, the protection of data and intellectual property and the freedom of information, among others. The political and human part involves the will to build capacities. 

“Establishing the technology is not enough; it requires will, budget, cooperation agreements, the establishment of networks and the provision of specific services,” said José Arriaga, Co-Founder, Orange Box.

Information exchange is possible without interoperability, but including it greatly improves performance, effectiveness and security, while reducing costs. Interoperability improves the patient’s experience, ensures transparency in processes and delineates who is responsible for a specific patient. 

Interoperability can also improve the continuity of attention within the Mexican health system. Due to its fragmentation, patient data does not travel with the patient. The duplication of data across hospitals involves added costs and reduces efficiency.

The integration of the system would avoid the repetition of processes and reduce costs while improving access to patient information. Continuity in care is important, especially in the case of chronic diseases managed at home. In addition, people are living longer and this demands that quality of life and care at home can be guaranteed.

Despite the multiple benefits that connectivity can bring to the health sector, being part of a connected world makes systems possible victims of cyberattacks. For this reason, cybersecurity has taken an important role in everything related to data management, specifically in the health sector. “Before, cybersecurity was not thought of. But when attacks increased, this issue began to be taken more seriously,” said Victor Medina, President, HL7.

“Health handles very sensitive data. Security has a cost because it entails constant updates as every week a new cybersecurity threat arises,” said Jesús Hernández, President, Asociación HealthTech+B31irst. 

The Mexican Official Standard NOM-024-SSA3-2010 establishes the functional objectives and functionalities that the Electronic Clinical Record Systems must observe to guarantee interoperability, processing, interpretation, confidentiality, security and use of information standards and catalogs of electronic health records. However, this norm has not been updated since 2010. “A standard must be defined for all systems in the country with a national digital health strategy. As long as we do not have a guideline that establishes obligations and has consequences, we will continue to have gaps in information security at any level but, above all, in health,” said Medina.

Several other problems are hampering the full adoption of interoperability in Mexico. Experts agree that the country needs to reach a higher level of maturity before implementing this technology. Once the country is prepared and has the necessary technology, Mexico will need a governmental entity that can validate compliance and an institution in charge of storing data for the exchange of information to be more effective, said Hernández. Meanwhile, laws must be created to protect health data and mandate how it should be distributed among the public and private health sectors.