The member companies of European-American Business Council recognize the crucial importance of developing and maintaining high-quality and cost-efficient health care systems.  Providing the best possible health care is a priority for governments, citizens, and the business community on both sides of the Atlantic.  The pace of innovation in medical science has led to unparalleled progress in development of health care solutions over the past fifty years, and the potential for greatly increasing the health, productivity, and prosperity of our citizens is greater than ever.  Yet our ability to fully realize this potential is hampered by a major obstacle – the gross inefficiencies in the process for actually delivering those solutions.

Rapidly ageing populations in the trans-Atlantic region are driving an increasing demand for health care, while an ever more mobile society is leading to greater risk of pandemics.  At the same time, the health care industry has not kept pace with other sectors in making use of information technology.  The potential for greater efficiency, accuracy, and lower costs through use of IT -- in maintaining and sharing patient information, home-based health monitoring for early detection and consistent treatment, and interoperable, global data exchange for tracking of contagious disease -- has been virtually untapped.  Inefficiencies combined with exponential growth in demand for healthcare directly threaten our ability to maintain a healthy, productive and competitive workforce.

To address this shortfall in application of technology for better management of health care systems, the members of EABC call upon US and European governments to focus greater attention on three key areas:

•  support of national and international frameworks that facilitates the development of interoperable systems for sharing of digital patient information.  Interoperability is not only a crucial goal in and of itself, but is also necessary to support:

establishment of a cross-border solution for sharing data crucial to the monitoring and containment of infectious diseases; and deployment of home-based health care technologies

To improve the quality and accuracy of health care, while reducing costs, we must ensure that clinical information can be shared between authorized caregivers. This can be achieved by introducing interoperable, standardized technologies within traditional points of care.  According to the Institute of Medicine, between 44,000 and 98,000 Americans die in hospitals each year as a result of preventable medical errors.  A major cause of this death rate is due to simple errors of transcription or interpretation of hand-written information – a problem easily solved through digitization of health data at the point of care.  Patients will greatly benefit from better healthcare through the deployment of interoperable electronic health records and electronic transmission of prescriptions.  As information technology leaders, we call on industry to introduce interoperable healthcare solutions to the market.

As we face greater and more frequent threats of pandemic disease, we propose that steps be taken to steps to contribute to real-time, real-place reporting of contagious disease.  Access to rapid commercial transportation has led to a mobile population, blurring of national boundaries, and a connected global society.  However, this same interconnectivity creates equal opportunities for the rapid spread of contagious disease.  Outbreaks of avian influenza or other diseases like SARS have the potential to inflict incredible loss of life, significant damage to economies, and disruption in the operations of business and government.   While it is a crucial first step to isolate infected populations, we feel transatlantic real-time data sharing is desperately needed so that governments can respond rapidly to contain outbreaks amongst citizens who may have been recently exposed to contagious disease.  Therefore, we call on the WHO, the European Commission and the United States Government to develop a roadmap for transatlantic exchange of relevant data.

To address in part the increased demand due to changing demographics, we must accelerate the deployment of technologies in the delivery of healthcare outside of the traditional hospital mainframe. Given that the over-60 population in developed countries is projected to increase from 42 million today to 278 million in 2050, we believe that new homecare technologies must compensate to meet increased demand for elder care that existing facilities will not be able to meet.  In addition, the challenges to existing health care infrastructure posed by ageing populations will be compounded by climbing obesity rates, producing an alarming growth in chronic disease.  Currently in the United States, nearly 20 percent of the population accounts for 80 percent of healthcare expenditure.  Of the 20 percent of the population with chronic disease, many patients have multiple chronic conditions.  European health systems are also expected to see patients with diabetes and other chronic disease double by the year 2015.

The convergence of medical and consumer electronic technologies offer new possibilities for early detection of chronic disease and in helping patients to receive care in their own homes through personal, adaptive home health systems that deliver the right assistance at the right time.  Daily interventions through home health technologies help keep patients healthy, active and at home with their loved ones—not in expensive acute and long-term care settings.

Contact:
Sara Tesorieri
Sara@EABC.org
www.EABC.org