Northlanders supported to access health records online

NEWS - eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth

A drop in service to help people access their health records online is visiting Te Tai Tokerau, Northland this February, in response to a regional project to provide hospital records via GP patient portals.

Te waka matihiko hauora is an initiative from the Digital Inclusion Alliance Aotearoa in collaboration with Te Whatu Ora – Te Tai Tokerau, Mahitahi Hauora, Manage My Health and Far North District Libraries.

Digital Inclusion Alliance Aotearoa operations director Laurence Zwimpfer says the catalyst was news that Northland was opening up access to hospital records - including referral notifications, clinic letters and discharge summaries - via the Manage My Health patient portal.

Of the 38 practices in Northland, 36 offer a patient portal. The majority offer Manage My Health, but Health 365 and the Centrik portal are also used.
Zwimpfer says people can be suspicious of online tools and need trusted people to provide support and answer questions.

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The alliance has converted an old school bus called Dora into a mobile learning centre and will travel to 21 locations in Northland in February.

Eleven trainers from local communities will be able to support people to use both the Health 365 and Manage My Health platforms as well as find an affordable internet connection.

Zwimpfer hopes a successful Northland trial could lead to a national programme, with Dora booked to do a similar tour of Southland in March in collaboration with Rural Women.

Around 75,000 Northlanders have a Manage My Health account, which since November 2023 has been automatically populated with hospital clinic and discharge letters.

Di Davis, portal project lead for Te Whatu Ora – Te Tai Tokerau, says referral notifications are being delivered later this year and people can opt out of viewing their hospital documents if they want to.

The project has been developed in collaboration with the Northland Health Consumer Council and Davis says consumers are very keen and happy to be able to see their own information, especially results.

Sending discharge summaries via the portal has also enabled patients to be able to be discharged earlier from hospital, she says.

In Northland, someone cannot be discharged until they get a paper copy of their discharge summary, but now the patient can opt to have their discharge summary sent to their portal, allowing them to leave right away and giving doctors more time to complete the documentation later in the day.

Davis says transitioning away from paper letters and other documents also avoids the risk of lost or delayed mail.

Te Whatu Ora is funding the cost of the Manage My Health portal in Northland for those practices agreeing to project terms which include proactive promotion to all their patients.

Davis said she is also reaching out to the other portal providers in the region to encourage them to connect to the data repository holding the hospital records.

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