Webwereld, 14 Nov 2011: 'Lower house wants to go ahead with EHR after all'

"A majority of the Lower House supports a motion to still introduce the Electronic Patient Record (EHR). Earlier, the Senate shot down the introduction.

The motion to go ahead anyway was tabled last Thursday by MPs Attje Kuiken (PvdA), Pieter Omtzigt (CDA) and Anne Mulder (VVD). Together, the three parties have a parliamentary majority. The motion is now expected to be debated in the Lower House this week.

The three parties are responding with the motion to the fact that the medical sector has insufficient interest in private continuation of the SPD infrastructure. GPs, hospitals and pharmacists had until last week to express their willingness to bear the cost of their own national network to link some 50 local medical databases. That willingness proved insufficient.
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Several organisations have sent a letter to the Lower House protesting against the continuation of the SPD. According to Privacy First and the KDVP foundation, an organisation of independent healthcare providers that watches over patients' privacy interests, the motion goes against the wishes of the Senate. Privacy First advocates reusing the LSP techniques without requiring them to be used nationwide, but rather regionally. Subsequently, patients themselves should have the choice to participate in it.

The KDVP foundation believes that "available alternatives have not been seriously and thoroughly investigated" and says that centralised access to medical personal data is "not secure". "Advocating for the relaunch of such an insecure system cannot be characterised in any other way than as a demonstration of incapacity," the foundation writes to the House of Representatives."

Read HERE the whole article at Webwereld.