‘Patchwork’ IT landscape draining resources and increasing risk

eHealthNews.nz: National Systems & Strategy

‘Patchwork’ IT landscape draining resources and increasing risk

Monday, 12 February 2024

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NEWS - eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth

New Zealand’s public health system is run on a ‘patchwork’ of around 4,000 IT systems that are not integrated, and are often out of date with no effective back-up, a briefing to the incoming Minister of Health says.

The briefing from Te Whatu Ora – Health NZ says the legacy IT landscape requires significant resources to maintain and is contributing to more serious and more frequent service outages.

It describes the health service’s digital portfolio as complex, saying it is made up of the data and digital environments of 28 former entities, which had varying degrees of maturity and quality.

The briefing says Te Whatu Ora inherited a physical and digital infrastructure portfolio with significant historic under-investment, and the new organisation is still uncovering new issues.

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“Capability and investment have varied across the country, with a patchwork of about 4,000 systems that are not integrated, and are often out of date with no effective back-up,” it says.

“Significant data gaps and limitations (e.g., different data structures) make integration labour intensive, compounded by legacy work practices that risk unsafe data sharing and breaches.”

Immediate priorities for data and digital include standardising and automating national data collection and building national consistency to mitigate the risk of privacy breaches and improve reporting and innovation.

Also, simplifying the clinical application landscape by moving to fewer, more robust platforms.

Migrating to the cloud is another priority, alongside “accelerating new ICT capabilities for new models of care and broadening investment beyond the traditional focus on hospital care to focus on shifting care closer to home”.

The briefing to Minister Reti from the Ministry of Health Manatū Hauora says harnessing opportunities offered through data, digital and emerging technologies is critical to address health system challenges.

“Technological advancement and emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence and genomics, create potential opportunities to help the health system work more efficiently and cost-effectively, while reducing pressures on the health workforce and improving sustainability of delivery over time,” it says.

“While some of the workforce and parts of our system are quick to adapt and innovate, our health systems and settings do not yet support us to take full advantage of new and emerging technologies.

The Ministry briefing document says significant investments have been made recently in digitisation and health infrastructure, particularly as part of the establishing of Health NZ, and more focus is required to modernise and complete the digital integration projects.