ELCA defines components of the future Swiss e-health-architecture

Responsibility for implementing Switzerland’s e-health strategy, which aims to give people in the country access to a cost-effective health system of high quality, efficiency and security, is managed by an office that co-ordinates between the Swiss Confederation and the country’s cantons. The strategy defines several objectives that, amongst others, will result in patients’ medical records being recorded electronically and making them easily exchanged between healthcare providers. For example, Objective A7 states that Swiss citizens should have access to their own electronic patient records at any time and in any place by the end of 2015.

The co-ordination office mandated ELCA to define the technical base components of the future Swiss e-health-architecture. The goal of the project was to develop a detailed vision of the architecture based on national and international standards (including IHE, Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise) and taking Swiss specifics into account.

ELCA developed a proposal that defines how the participants can operate with each other and exchange data by connecting themselves to a backbone via an IHE gateway, an approach that allows maximum flexibility.