MY VIEW – Working with communities on digital health

VIEW - Hūhana Lyndon, Green Party health Spokesperson, list MP based in Tai Tokerau 

Developments in digital health technology have given us new ways of delivering and accessing healthcare services for patients and practitioners alike. 

These changes are happening quickly, and while there is a role that digital health can play in delivering services and strengthening our systems, it is important we ensure that digital health is used to support care, not replace it entirely. 

Community input

As the Green Party health spokesperson, one of my main priorities is ensuring that the changes and decisions we make are made with input from our communities to ensure the needs and wants of our people and providers are being met. 

This also applies to digital health: we need to work with communities to identify where there are opportunities to use digital health, and where investment or continued use of non-digital systems remains better practice. 

Many communities across Aotearoa already experience inequity and inaccessibility in our health system. Not only does this lead to poor health outcomes, but it also erodes public trust and means people do not feel confident they can get the care they need. 

This is especially the case for our rural communities, who often suffer from after hours medical services being scaled back, temporary closures, reduced operating hours, and people being re-directed to telehealth appointments, rather than being seen in person. 

Similar experiences are shared with our Māori, Pasifika, seniors, rainbow communities, and tāngata whaikaha. These communities already face barriers when it comes to accessing healthcare, so we need to make sure that if digital health is introduced, it makes a meaningful difference that genuinely improves the delivery of services and patient experience. 

Funding digital health

Alongside listening to our communities, we also need to ensure digital health is getting the resources and funding needed. 

Over the past three years, the current Government has made damaging cuts to our healthcare sector which has directly impacted digital development, patient trust, data protection and staffing. 

We have seen 1,815 jobs cut from the Data and Digital Teams at Te Whatu Ora. At the same time, we have seen hospitals across the motu experience IT outages, meaning already stretched staff are having to rely on pen and paper while continuing to deliver essential care and waiting for systems to start again. 

This can lead to more stress on staff, delayed surgeries, and puts patients at risk. If we are going to implement digital health, we need to make sure we have the investment and infrastructure required to make this work, as well as processes in place to ensure that if outages do happen, our health system is not put under more pressure. 

We also need to make sure we have the opportunity to hire the right people, with the right skills to make these changes and engage with our communities.

Digital safety

Digital safety is also incredibly important. The Manage My Health data breach earlier this year is another example of what happens if we fail to properly invest in digital health, and the importance of putting patient wellbeing at the centre of decision making. 

The breach led to 120,000 New Zealanders having their medical information compromised. Discharge documents, medical history, prescriptions and private records were accessed by bad actors. This incident damaged public trust, put strain on our system and raised questions around data governance. 
If we are going to use digital health systems, we need to make sure we have the correct care, safeguards, oversight and transparency in place so these systems can work effectively, and that we have public trust.

Like the introduction of any new technology, we need to weigh up where is most appropriate for digital health to be used, the role it can play in our communities, as well as understanding the potential risks and impact it can have. 

If we are going to adopt digital health, we need to make sure it is something that we properly invest, resource and regulate. 

With the input of our people and the proper funding, we can make digital health work for all of us. 

If you want to contact eHealthNews.nz regarding this View, please email the editor Rebecca McBeth.

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