Hong Kong's doctors would have access to a common software platform that could enable patient-data sharing with public hospitals, the Medical Association announced yesterday.
The Clinic Management System will be available to the more than 7,000 registered doctors free from August 28. It standardises patient-data storage with that of the Hospital Authority. It can also be connected to the health-voucher system for the elderly and a future electronic health record system.
Ho Chung-ping, chairman of the association's information technology committee, said the free software may encourage doctors to participate in programmes such as the voucher scheme, which required doctors to use computers. He said only 20 to 30 per cent of doctors were now using management software.
A common platform could also facilitate infectious disease surveillance, Dr Ho said. Doctors were currently required to report a number of diseases to the Centre for Health Protection on a weekly basis, but the new system would allow the information to be updated immediately.
The software was developed by the Medical Association and the Information and Software Industry Association with government financing of about HK$1 million.
It is the first open-source software of its kind in Hong Kong - 'open source' meaning that users can freely edit the program. Dr Ho said that doctors could therefore customise the system according to their needs.
