Dubai: Dubai Health Authority (DHA) has unified over 7 million medical records and more than 31,000 clinicians and 382 health care facilities as part of the NABIDH initiative. More than 43 medical record systems are also part of the initiative, DHA said on Wednesday.
NABIDH is an ongoing digital transformation project that will ensure one electronic medical file for every patient.
The health authority gave an update about the initiative after holding a workshop with relevant stakeholders to discuss the progress of the initiative and ways to enhance integration with the health sector in the emirate.
Awadh Seghayer Al Ketbi, director general of DHA, highlighted the progress made by this initiative and emphasised that DHA focuses on utilising the latest health care technologies to ensure the provision of the highest quality of medical services.
Al Ketbi highlighted that adopting the latest technology is in line with the Emirate’s strategy of providing the highest quality of services to community members.
He said moving towards a digital ecosystem in the health sector is vital to help serve patients better, enhance efficiencies, reduce clinical waste, provide personalised patient-centered care and securely use data to develop public health policies to enhance community health. NABIDH project is one of the main initiatives that will enable us to create a digital health ecosystem for Dubai.
Al Ketbi said continued collaboration with hospitals across the public and the private health sector is a key component for creating a robust health sector in the Emirate.
Benefits for patients
NABIDH has several benefits for all stakeholders in the health care ecosystem, DHA pointed out.
For patients, it means that their health care provider will have one electronic medical file with all their medical reports safely stored and that when the patient moves from one facility to another, the medical file will follow.
The project is linked to the UAE’s Riayati initiative, ensuring that every person in the UAE has one electronic medical file in future.
The initiative enhances efficiency, minimises the risk of medical errors, empowers patients and health care providers. The digital transformation initiative aims to revolutionise health care delivery in Dubai through a digital platform, which enables central storage and secure exchange of patient health information between health care professionals.
Avoiding duplication of tests
Additionally, NABIDH will also provide evidence-based gold standard data for public health and well-being initiatives to enhance population health and disease prevention.
Dr Mohammad Al Redha, director of DHA’s Health Informatics and Smart Health Department said: “With easy access to aggregated patient records, physicians of NABIDH connected facilities are already seeing the benefit of this system. NABIDH helps make faster, well-informed decisions, reduces the duplication of tests, and ultimately improve quality of care.”
Al Redha added that NABIDH will ensure continuity of care, convenience and patients can seek second medical opinions without the need to physically carry their medical files.
He said that DHA aims to achieve 100 per cent compliance for hospitals and that the next stage will include onboarding of clinics.
