Electronic Health Records (EHR) is a digital version of a patient’s paper chart, containing information about their medical history, diagnoses, medications, treatment plans, immunization dates, allergies, radiology images, and laboratory test results. EHRs are designed to be accessed and shared by authorized healthcare providers, improving the efficiency and coordination of patient care.
As we all know, The first and most important step in providing medical care is history taking, which involves a review of the patients medical records and history of illnesses, both past and present…
This will not be possible without a working EHR system in Nigeria as people often relocate and visit different healthcare facilities which most times keep their data records on paper and medical data Sharing among Healthcare facilities is almost non-existent in Nigeria…
This poses a major problem as a patient could suffer severe, life threatening adverse drug reactions or hypersensitivity reactions from the therapy he/she is placed on when accurate history taking of the patient’s allergies and contraindications is not done… And this problem is 100% avoidable….
There is therefore a need for a national electronic health records database for all Nigerians as this will help prevent such life threatening conditions and ultimately improve the quality of patient care for all nigerians…
If given the opportunity, I would propose and actually work on creating a national database for all nigerians that is linked to their national identity number (NIN), the field containing their NIN would function as the primary key in the database and the federal government should mandate all EHR companies/startups and healthcare facilities in Nigeria to share their data records of all patient with the federal agency responsible for managing this database….
This way, a great deal of medical data can be gathered for every individual and it would eventually help to provide better healthcare for all nigerians….
Some of the advantages of a national EHR database include:
1) A Centralized Information Pool For All Healthcare Organizations
2) Improved Efficiency
3) Improved Data Integrity
4) Better Decision Making by National Healthcare Agencies and Other Healthcare Organizations
5) Better Resource Allocation Optimization
6) Faster Response in Emergencies
Improved Research and Analysis of Healthcare Data
7) Standardization of Data Formats, Terminology, and Protocols, Ensuring Consistency and Interoperability Across Different Systems and Organizations.
Dr. Onyeka Onwughai
Chief Information Officer, RxPress Health