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Rumbidzayi Zinyuke, Senior Health Reporter
Zimbabwe will soon introduce digital health ID cards to enhance patient care, improve medical record management and enhance overall healthcare outcomes while at the same time maintaining patient confidentiality with the patient required to positively grant permission to access the health records.
The digital health ID serves as a unique identifier for each patient, linking them to a comprehensive electronic health record that stores vital information such as medical history, allergies, medications, and immunisation records. The need for confidentiality is the reason why separate health ID cards are required rather than just use National ID cards.
The innovation is being implemented under the Impilo system, which is meant to improve efficiency in the health sector through enhancing data collection, management, and patient care as well as improve communication between health practitioners and patients.
By digitising patient data, the Ministry of Health and Child Care expects that this will allow health professionals to access accurate and up-to-date information, leading to more informed and efficient decision-making.
Deputy director of the Ministry of Health and Child Care’s health informatics and data analytics department, Dr Robert Gongora, said this was in line with the Cybersecurity and Data Protection Act which sought to protect patients’ privacy.
“The Cybersecurity and Data Protection Act says we can no longer use the national IDs to identify clients because of privacy and confidentiality concerns. There are many points where national ID numbers are collected, which means there could be many people holding them. So, if we are going to have platforms like these personal health records, where you use your ID to access your health record, anyone else who has access to your ID number can then open it. So, we are going to be issuing, starting the first quarter next year, every person who visits a health ID card,” he said.
The health ID card is expected to have a chip that allows it to carry data and allow patients to do various health transactions.
Dr Gongora said with the National Health Insurance coming on board, the health ID would be used when accessing the insurance or any other health services.
“It means if you move from point A to B and you have your ID, they use that ID to identify you and retrieve your record from the central point. The electronic health record has components like a client registry as well as a health provider registry. This ensures that they have a provider ID which is issued by the respective authority which allows you to log onto our platforms. So, a provider is identified and authenticated and at the same time the client is identified and authenticated before one can access their record,” he added.
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