The European Commission has published a report on the cost-effectiveness of standards-driven eHealth data exchange of data as part of the Digital Europe programme, in an effort to establish universal standards and improve knowledge-sharing and strengthen digital health networks among member states.
The report outlines a final roadmap for how to work with clinical content in profiles and competing standards in large-scale eHealth deployments. The roadmap contains guidelines on how to incorporate general and personal health information into clinical practice and public health policy. The aim is to facilitate communication of best practices between eHealth projects undertaken across Europe.
The study makes practical recommendations for promoting the use of the standards:
- Develop a strategy to communicate and disseminate the use of standards-driven tools, showing evidence of their positive impact in the development of projects and products.
- Develop simple indicators and/or refine the indicators used in this study in order to quantify the progress of adoption of standards-driven tools.
- Identify the weaknesses and limitations associated with deploying standards and tools.
- Develop conformity assessments and testing platforms for better adoption of the standards.
Further information about the eStandards project of the European Commission available at www.estandards-project.eu