Development of an ICT – based e-Health System with Integrated e-Prescription

This paper describes our development activities of an ICT-based e-health system for community healthcare, consisting of five stages: system design and development, human resource development, e-health system realization, laboratory & field tests and implementation of the e-health system, as well as the follow-up actions. Initially, some ereadiness evaluations (for the medical personnel in two community health centres) were conducted, through a number of field visits and questionnaires. The results had been used in the e-health system design & development, installation of the internet access infrastructure, and implementation of the education & hands-on training for the medical & administrative staff of the healthcare units. All the staff members of the targeted healthcare unit have completed a series of hands-on training on personal basis, required for operating the ICTbased e-health system. After completing the e-health system design & development as well as system realization and laboratory tests stages, a series of field implementation and experiments have been successfully conducted. A number of users’ feedbacks have been obtained and used for further improvements on both software and hardware modules. The e-health system with integrated e-prescription module has shown its expected functions in: patient registration, medical record, paperless prescription, and producing the required reports. Further follow-up actions (in the forms of continuing education and technical supports) are required for sustainability of the ICT-based community healthcare e-health system. When the ICT-based e-health system could be implemented in more and more community health centres in Indonesia, it is expected that in the long run, the community healthcare will be gradually improved, thus to contribute towards achieving the MDGs, especially in healthcare.