International Symposium on eHealth and Telemedicine, Bayview Plaza February 10, 2011
February 12, 2011 11:18 am | by Beverly Lorraine Ho, MD | Posted in News
The National Telehealth Center, the country’s pioneering organization in eHealth, health the First International Symposium on eHealth and Telemedicine (ISeT) at the Bayview Plaza.
eHealth, or the use of ICT for health has long been a proposed solution to much of the problems in the health sector. While eHealth enthusiasts – physicians, information technologists and informaticians – have piloted some work, little has been done to document these efforts and rigorous research in the area has been sparse, especially those that are set in local context. As such, paucity of evidence of its success prevented it from being formally embraced by decision-makes at the institutional and government levels.
It was in this light that renowned institutions in Asia led by the Aga Khan University (AKU) of Pakistan with the aid of the International Development and Research Center of Canada (IDRC) and the University of Calgary, Canada, established the PAN Asian Collaboration for Evidence-based e-Health Adoption and Application (PANACeA). The main goal was to generate evidence of the benefits of eHealth while taking into account the local social and cultural context. It was thought out to be a 4-year project, which officially began in February 2007. Since then, project partners across Central, South and SouthEast Asia have started working on 8 projects. The collaboration sought to provide a venue for sharing knowledge, increase research scope and capacity, as well as support independence.
As the end of the PANACEA grant drew near, a venue was sought to reexamine whether the initial objectives were met and what the outcomes of the 8 projects were. The National Telehealth Center, the country’s pioneering organization in eHealth, thus organized the First International Symposium on eHealth and Telemedicine (ISeT) primarily to set the stage for information dissemination and open dialogue in this field.
The ISeT was successfully held at the Bayview Park Hotel, Manila on February 10, 2011 with more than seventy participants from five countries. Various stakeholders from different sectors of the country were present, namely, Department of Health, Department of Science and Technology, Philippine Health Insurance Corporation, Congressional Committee on Science, Technology, and Engineering, and the World Health Organization. Medical students from the UP College of Medicine were also present.
Dr. Alberto Romualdez, former Secretary of Health and convenor of the UHC Study Group, as keynote speaker, emphasized the potential role of eHealth in achieving universal health care.
In the morning, participants from the Philippines, Malaysia and India discussed the outcomes of their respective PANACEA projects. In the afternoon, mHealth applications (electronic Integrated Management of Childhood Illnesses (eIMCI), Pasay SMS Appointment Reminder System for Prenatal Care, Frontline SMS for Telemedicine, Surveillance in Post Extreme Emergencies and Disasters (SPEED) and ATOM) and eHealth applications (Community Health Information Tracking System (CHITS), OpenMRS and OpenERP, Department of Health (DoH) Rural Health Unit Management Information System (RHUMIS), PhilHealth IT Initiatives, RxBox: A Telemedicine Device) were showcased in a series of short talks. This was followed by eLearning and Knowledge Management initiatives (MOODLE for Course Management, Elluminate for Remote Teaching, Plone for Knowledge Management, The Western Pacific Region Index Medicus).
Dr. Mark Landry of the World Health Organization shared his outlook on the future of eHealth in Asia and the Pacific. The day ended with participants affixing their signatures in the ISeT tarpaulin as a sign of their commitment to the advancement of eHealth in their respective fields/countries.
The following day, members of the PANACEA proceeded to a 2-day workshop to evaluate at length lessons from the past four years. The workshop also provided the unique opportunity of renewing relationships and strengthening networks, opening the possibility of second phase for PANACEA.
