EHR procurement will take more than a year

The evaluation of tenders for the national electronic health record (EHR) has commenced, but the procurement process will take over a year to complete, the IMO AGM heard.

Mr Damien McCallion, HSE Chief Technology and Transformation Officer, spoke to delegates on digitising health services during a ‘hot topic’ discussion session.

Mr McCallion described the EHR
plans as a “major programme” and a “huge investment”.

“We had to go through a very robust process,” he told the meeting. “We had a team of 20 people working on that [EHR] business case alone… to get through various stages. We went to tender – we have tenders now in. We are evaluating those at the moment.”

Mr McCallion pointed out that the evaluation group is “largely made up of clinical people nominated from the health regions”.

He said the procurement process “will probably take another 14 or 15 months because of the scale of the contract”.

“The plan is that we will then do a national configuration and design… and then the first deployment is in Dublin North East. Then after that we are looking at the sequence for the other five
health regions.”

Speaking from the floor, outgoing IMO President Dr Anne Dee, Consultant in Public Health Medicine, raised concerns over health inequalities and whether marginalised groups will be left behind.

In response, Mr McCallion said the HSE had “learned a lot” about working with marginalised patients during the Covid-19 pandemic.

He added he was confident that this challenge would be overcome in moving to the new system.

Mr McCallion added that “clinical leadership” would be “key” to the digital programme’s success.

“Sláintecare has set digital transformation as a priority, [and there is] a clear strategy in place.”

Dr Dee and other speakers from the floor expressed disappointment with the lack of progress on digital reform within the health service in recent years.

In early February, the Government approved plans to proceed with the procurement of an EHR system. The decision followed completion of the preliminary business case and independent external assurance processes, which confirmed compliance with the State’s infrastructure guidelines. Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill described the development as a “landmark step”.

Last month, the Medical Independent reported that there was “significant industry interest” in the procurement process. HSE Chief Clinical Information Officer Prof Richard Greene made the comments at the IHCA’s FutureCare conference in Dublin.