Digital Investment Plan finalised by end of year

NEWS - eHealthNews.nz editor Rebecca McBeth 

The Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora 10-year Digital Investment Plan will be finalised before the end of the year and the organisation’s digital services restructure is also nearly complete, the acting director of health strategy and design says.

Jean Fleming told the Tech Users Summit in Auckland this month that Health NZ expects to finalise the plan before the end of 2025.

The Digital Investment Plan (DIP) aims to modernise the country's healthcare infrastructure, addressing years of fragmented investment that have left systems outdated and underfunded

Health Minister Simeon Brown says the plan will outline the next 10 years of investment needed “to be able to give confidence to our public health system around what is required to make a real difference”.

The DIP’s creation was announced in June 2024 when former minister of health Shane Reti said that he would consider new investment in data and digital later that year as part of a new 10-year plan setting out the size and scale of investment needed for digital infrastructure.

Fleming said, "we cannot sustainably improve health outcomes, lift productivity or enable new models of care without robust, resilient digital infrastructure. It is as simple, but yet as complex as that."

She told the summit - hosted by the Tech Users Association NZ and Digital Health Association – that the DIP focuses on a three-year rolling investment plan with funding attached and annual reviews to stay responsive.

She said Health NZ spent just 2.6 per cent of its operating costs on digital services in 2024, which is well below international benchmarks of between four and eight per cent, and that underinvestment has left the organisation with a digital infrastructure that is "no longer fit for purpose" in many places.

The plan focuses on seven key investment areas  and includes targeted investment in high-priority clinical areas such as radiology, cancer and mental health.

"The scope of this focus area will adjust as business and government priorities develop," Fleming said.

She told attendees that stabilisation, modernisation and innovation will all be happening at the same time.

"That is the reality of working in our complex system: we need to shore up what is fragile, modernise what is outdated and create space for innovation all in parallel,” she said.

The organisation is exploring various funding options, including reprioritising within baseline budgets, adjusting capital and operating expenditure profiles, considering alternative funding and financing mechanisms, and seeking future government investments.

The health minister told the New Zealand Private Surgical Hospitals Association Conference on September 18 that there are 6000 data systems in use at Health New Zealand. 

“There is one for every 16 people, so that is a big problem,” he told attendees.

Brown said that when DHBs were amalgamated to create Health NZ, the IT systems were not centralised.

“There is an enormous amount of work needed around data, digital, financial, operating systems, patient records, to make sure that we can get maximum efficiency out of health New Zealand,” he told the conference.

"We are working on a digital investment plan… which will outline the next 10 years of investment required to be able to give confidence to our public health system around what is required to make that real difference, and a lot of that is about productivity."

Fleming said the Digital Investment Plan is coordinated with the Health Infrastructure Plan for physical infrastructure and the Health Technology Plan covering clinical equipment, enabling a a shift toward unified decision-making after years of fragmented investment.

Health New Zealand's digital services restructure, which began in mid-2024, is also nearly finished and aligns with four regions, each with its own dedicated digital director.

Hear more about the DIP and from the health minister at Digital Health Week 2025 this November 24-27 in Ōtautahi Christchurch. Register today.

Image: Jean Fleming, acting director of health strategy and design, speaking at the Tech Users Summit in Auckland on September 10, 2025

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