Hospitals to adopt HIS

Star: PETALING JAYA: The Health Ministry may settle for HIS (hospital information system) after THIS (total hospital information system) did not work out too well in Selayang and Putrajaya.
THIS was touted as an information technology concept, which integrates the clinical, management and financial systems of a hospital.
The so-called paperless system is designed into modules to cover all aspects of a patient’s record from clinical to administrative.
HIS is a partially paperless system that also covers in-patient and outpatient management, pharmacy, patient billing and medical records tracking.
“It will not truly be paperless, which would be nice if it were.
“But in a practical sense THIS may not be easy to implement,” Health Ministry director-general Tan Sri Dr Ismail Merican told The Star.
The Selayang Hospital was the first hospital to apply THIS in 1999 to create a “paperless and filmless” work environment.
Several types of software were combined to create THIS.
Its main software stores medical records of patients and is linked to other medical sections such as laboratories.
Since then, other hospitals have been designed on the THIS concept, including Putrajaya Hospital, Sultan Abdul Halim Hospital in Sungai Petani and Temerloh Hospital.
Dr Ismail said the Selayang and Putrajaya hospitals revealed “challenges” in the software, mindset change among healthcare providers and the system itself.
“We are not saying that Selayang Hospital was not successful.
“It was a bit of a learning curve for us to be truly paperless. THIS might not be doable. We may settle for HIS,” he said.
He added that while 13 government hospitals with THIS would remain, the ministry would, in stages, implement HIS in all other hospitals.