"In an area such as health, this lack of operational knowledge can have critical and even life-endangering consequences," the society's submission to the independent review of NEHTA's performance says.
"There is a concern that the almost academic approach could lead to complex, costly and possibly unsafe systems being implemented," the submission says.
A survey of society members rated NEHTA's work programs as highly important, but found it was not meeting expectations.
Society chief executive Dr Brendan Lovelock said the survey could not be easily dismissed. "This is a consistent view from informed stakeholders whose support will be required to achieve the high-level objectives for health system change that were intended from NEHTA.
"It would be better to resolve the identified and important issues around engagement and style within the existing structures to avoid a repeat of the hiatus that occurred with the formation of NEHTA."
A key issue was the narrow range of skills among NEHTA's board members.
"This is not a reflection on the competence of people currently serving on the board, but more a recognition of the breadth of the task required to transition Australia to a new e-health environment and the consequent need to have representatives that are reflective of the major stakeholder groups," the society says.
Other concerns are the culture and management style of senior managers, lack of content in communications, cost and lack of useful outcomes, poor return on investment and complex and bureaucratic processes.
NEHTA appointed Boston Consulting Group to conduct a statutory review of its operations 2 1/2 years after it was established as a non-profit, corporatised entity owned by the federal, state and territory governments. The chief executives of each jurisdiction's health service comprise the board.
Boston Consulting, which originally recommended the creation of NEHTA, is to report its findings, including recommendations for future directions and governance, to the NEHTA board for its final decision.
A spokeswoman for NEHTA declined to comment while the review was ongoing.
Independent health IT consultant Dr David More said progress on e-health to date was "a national disgrace". "It really is hard to overstate just how important proper deployment of e-health is in Australia, and just how badly it has been handled to date," he says in his submission to Boston Consulting.
"The bottom line is that what NEHTA is trying to do is very badly needed, but the way they are going about it is deeply flawed, and their direction needs serious modification."
Dr More said a change in governance arrangements was urgently needed: "NEHTA has virtually no practising clinicians working with it, and manifests virtually no insight into the way the health system really works.
"The private sector simply ignores NEHTA, while the public sector merely pays lip service to its recommendations."
The health messaging standards body, HL7 Australia, said it was not possible for NEHTA to meet its key objectives because it "does not have the mandate, the level of funding and ability to offer incentives or the collaborative ethos" needed to achieve those outcomes.
Autor(en)/Author(s): Ben Woodhead
Quelle/Source: Australian IT, 07.08.2007
