The significance of information standards for development of integrated health information system

Information systems play a significant role in helping to improve health outcomes and decision-making at the point of care, as well as in the planning and funding of care. There is no doubt that new technologies, especially information and communication technologies, could dramatically contribute to achieve better results in our activities in general. The healthcare sector, one of the largest sectors of society accounting, is very complex with many different application requirements. There are also a number of different types of actors that need to communicate for various healthcare purposes (patients/citizens, healthcare professionals and organizations providing health care cervices, payment bodies, pharmaceutical industry, the national governments). Standardization is the first and the most important step in building an Integral Healthcare Information System. However, standardization has been recognized in most of the countries as an important tool to achieve some of the general goals in healthcare systems. The relationship between the participants locally, regionally and nationally requires that information is shared for planning, funding and treatment purposes. Health information standards are instrumental for the operation of healthcare organizations, the planning and management of the health sector, for electronic business transactions and the development of a national system of electronic health records as well. It is necessary to make relevant decisions on adoption of specific health information standards, to adjust them to local conditions as necessary, define in sufficient details methods the manner of their introduction and implementation. The successful implementation of each National Health Information Systems Strategy is heavily dependent upon the implementation of information standards