IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

The medical experts at the launch of the Intel powered Dell tablet for healthcare organised by Dell and Intel held on Tuesday in Lagos said it would help in providing quality healthcare services between doctors and patients. They also said patients can utilize ICT to access information about a particular hospital or it can help patients to book an appointment with doctor.

The minister, who stated this in Abuja at the first Pan African Health Summit organised by the Ministry Health, Federal Capital territory (FCT) in conjunction with INTEL Corporation, said this would enhance the delivery of mobile health care using information technologies for a healthier Nigeria.

According to its President, Mr Wole Ajayi, electronic health record gives physicians, patients and other health care providers’ access to patient’s medical record facilities.

He, however, said the proposed Health Bill, which was about to be signed by Mr President, is aimed at providing a framework for standardisation and regulation of health services, may not be favourably disposed to health record.

In a recent paper titled: “Challenges and Opportunity for eHealth in Nigeria,” Mohammed Lecky, director, Planning, Research and Statistics Department, Federal Ministry of Health said the world is gone ICT way and time for the country to integrate its health progammes with ICT is now.

He revealed that many health agencies, especially in the developed countries, and more recently in a good number of developing countries are taking advantage of ICT, to ensure that people have access to healthcare with ease.

The Health Information Managers Association of Nigeria (HIMAN) has called for electronic health (e-health) record keeping to enhance quality health care.

According to HIMAN President, Wole Ajayi, e-health record gives doctors, patients and other health care providers quick and easy access to patients’ medical record facilities.

Ajayi said the proposed health bill is designed to provide a framework for regulation of health services, and may not be favourable towards health records, explaining that the health bill failed to cover the statute of limitation on the retention of hospital and clinical records.

Commissioner for Health Lagos State, Prof. Akin Abayomi, and the Guest speaker at the Youth Consultation on Digital Health Technology programme, held in Ikeja, Lagos, Njideka Ngeli, have explored how to use digital technology to accelerate universal healthcare coverage.

Abayomi said: “This is opportunity to engage our digital entrepreneurs to help us in delivering healthcare to Nigerians especially at the primary healthcare level. We are tired of using old methods in information dissemination in healthcare system for instance, using files to keep information sometimes file got missing and it makes things very slow and we find it difficult to get useful information but this is time for us to digital.”

The Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (Lautech) Teaching Hospital, Osogbo is in the process of converting its conventional administrative and medical activities to an electronic and online system.

The Chief Medical Director of the hospital, Professor Femi Fadiora, told medical consultants in Lagos yesterday that the teaching hospital in a few weeks to come will begin to operate a full e-health system with a fully integrated e-payment module.

The Ministry of Youth and Sports Development has launched a slew of online training initiatives and programmes to engage the youth during the COVID-19 lockdown. Through its digital skills online training, its Youth Innovation Series, Webinars and E-Sports initiatives the Youth and Sports Ministry is delivering opportunities to the youth and Nigerians.

The IBM, in partnership with the ministry, three weeks ago started the online digital skills training with over 7,000 youth participating with the chance to get IBM badges. The new addition is the Webinars set to start next week. It will be thrice weekly webinars to further increase online interaction and study in areas of interest to the youth.

A national conference looking at deploying information and communication technology has opened in Abuja.

Declaring it open, the minister said stakeholders must galvanise "action toward ensuring ICT is employed in the best manner that will help to drive the health sector toward" targets set in the National Health Development Plan.

Prof. Anthony V Pais, a Senior Consultant Surgical Oncology from the Hospital, who spoke last week during the opening of a new centre for Nigerians, said telemedicine will dissociate financial status and quality healthcare.

"Telemedicine involves use of medical information transferred from one site to another through electronic communications to improve patient health care, including diagnosis and treatment while reducing cost. We discuss any patient every week with a group of doctors and this will reduce the rate at which people seek for better care abroad."

A plan to develop seven ‘pathfinder’ sites to lead the widespread adoption of telehealth in England has been scrapped and replaced with a new scheme after progress stalled in mid-2013.

NHS England will instead promote a wider suite of telehealth services in areas where ‘energy already exists’ for the technologies.

The adviser to President Daniel Ortega for social affairs, Dr. Guillermo Gonzalez, said that collaboration is part of the agreements signed recently at talks among officials from both governments in Moscow.

A group of private health professionals under the aegis of National e-health working Group said tele-health has a huge future in Nigeria with ready telephone users of about 67 million. Some of the challenges to telemedicine as noted at the conference included lack of policy, lack of public funding, licensing provider, reimbursement, fear of malpractice, high bandwidth telecommunications cost and inadequate power supply.

The experts, who gathered at the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan for a workshop titled ‘Telemedicine: Future and Challenges in Nigeria’, said telemedicine seeks to bridge the gap of access to good health between the rural and urban dwellers, describing it as ‘a confluence of communication technology, information technology, bio-medical engineering and medical science.

The gathering, drawn from medical practitioners and Information Technology (IT) experts pointed out that much as electronic healthcare was a laudable venture, certain wishes which include the standard of practice, electricity supply and cost would need to be addressed before Nigeria can think of connecting.

Chief Medical Director (CMD) of EBSUTH, Dr. Onyebuchi Chukwu while receiving the President EBSUTH Staff Cooperative Thrift and Credit Society Limited, Dr. Chidi Esike that presented him an award giving to the society by the National Institute of cooperative professionals, said the hospital has obtained the service of medical informatics expert who he said has been doing so well to develop IT facilities in the hospital.

Adebola, who spoke in Lagos recently, said such strategies would help in coordinating the use of telemedicine and e-health tools in national health system.

He said government must put in place a policy that would enable the private sector take advantage of e-health services in the country.

Addressing the opening session, the Minister of Science and Technology, Alhaji Alhassan Bako Zaku disclosed that the success recorded by the pilot project of Telemedicine had been acknowledged by the various state governments in the country leading to the directive given to their various ministries of health to set up their networks to reach the rural areas and enhance referral systems.

Governor Babatunde Fashola stated this on Wednesday at this year’s Public Health Lecture entitled: “Peculiar Disease and Health Related Conditions in Nigeria: We Shall Overcome and We Must Overcome Them.”