Federal Council proposes mandatory electronic health dossier

Switzerland’s electronic patient dossier has failed to meet expectations, prompting the Federal Council to propose a new electronic health dossier, SRF reports. The proposal would give everyone living in Switzerland a dossier unless they object, while making participation mandatory for healthcare providers that bill through compulsory health insurance.

At the Dr Gurtner pharmacy and drugstore in Bümpliz, a suburb of Bern, customers have been able to open an electronic patient dossier for five years. Branch manager Nino Sperisen voluntarily turned the pharmacy into a pilot site.

“Our main motivation was to make documents such as current prescriptions and medication plans easier to access,” Sperisen said. He had also expected the dossier to reduce administrative work, including discussions with doctors about customers’ medication plans.

In practice, however, only a small proportion of the population has opened an electronic patient dossier, while many healthcare institutions do not participate. As a result, relevant data is often unavailable through the dossier.

“Ideally, every resident of Switzerland would have an electronic patient dossier,” Sperisen said. He also criticised the system’s usability.

The Federal Council’s plan would rename the electronic patient dossier as the electronic health dossier. The federal government would take responsibility for the technical infrastructure and require providers such as pharmacies, doctors’ practices and physiotherapy practices to participate.

Sperisen supports the proposal. “The full potential of such a solution can only be realised when all healthcare providers participate,” he said.

At the Bümpliz pharmacy, pharmacy specialist Svenja Romano serves between 30 and 40 customers each day. Asked how often she consults the electronic patient dossier, she said: “Actually, hardly ever.”

The Swiss pharmacists’ association Pharmasuisse also supports the proposal. Association president Martine Ruggli said the dossier could significantly improve patient safety, patient pathways and cooperation between healthcare professionals.

Sharing patient data through the electronic health dossier could help prevent duplicate examinations and reduce costs, according to the report.

Several important healthcare associations opposed discussions on the new health dossier in spring because of federal savings that could have affected the planned health data space. The data space is intended to store patients’ information and health data, which doctors, physiotherapists and pharmacies could access through the electronic health dossier when patients grant them permission.

The associations had argued that the health dossier would be pointless without the health data space. Since the data space is now expected to go ahead as planned, they consider discussions on the health dossier constructive. The hospital association H+ and the doctors’ association FMH also basically support the proposal.