Bringing the PCEHR system to life

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The Australian Government’s vision for a national, secure e-Health system will benefit Australians in many ways.
A key part to delivering effective e-Health is the “PCEHR” system

The “HR” stands for Health Record, something many of us already have. The details of visits we make to health services, such as a GP, emergency department or medical centre are stored in local computers and paper files; these are our health records.

The “E” stands for Electronic. This allows your health record to be available in a digital format through the PCEHR system, and then available on computers and mobile devices.

The “PC” stands for Personally Controlled. This means that you decide IF you want an electronic record, and who you allow to access it.

Having a Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record means that you can be more actively involved in your own health care.

You will have access to the information within your own record.

Your PCEHR will contain important information about you – any alerts, current conditions, medications, and allergies.

As other health information systems are ready to connect, your PCEHR may evolve to provide more information such as summaries of GP or hospital visits, medicines prescribed, treatments and results of various tests.

This will happen through the PCEHR System, which provides connectivity to health information, and controls access to that information.

The PCEHR system, through its indexing service, allows your healthcare information to be located when and where it is needed.

The system will use your individual healthcare identifier as the key to locating and controlling access to your healthcare information.

You will be involved in the decisions of what information can be seen and who will access it, and the system enforces secure authorised access to this information.

Health care providers already store their patient’s information in their own systems. These can be a GP’s desktop computer, or a Hospital’s networked system.

Information from these systems that is valuable to record over time, such as a discharge summary or medicines prescribed, is uploaded with your permission to secure repositories, so that it will be available when and where you need it.

Repositories may be national, state, or privately operated. Some, for example pathology and radiology, are not necessarily created for the PCEHR system but are securely accessed by it.

Other repositories may be included specifically in the PCEHR system, such as a national repository for Healthcare Summaries.

And some health organisations will be large enough to have their own repositories.

Regardless, if a repository is authorised to connect to the PCEHR system, then the system can make that information available to assist with your health care.

Patients and authorised health care providers will be able to access the information available through the PCEHR system.

When you, or those involved in your healthcare, need to view information, first the system will ensure you are authorised.

The PCEHR system then uses the index to locate your healthcare information from the various repositories.

With the PCEHR system in place, not only will it benefit your healthcare, and your healthcare provider, it will support better healthcare for all Australians.