Welcome Message

Our vision is to develop a territory-wide Electronic Health Record (eHR) system. It would serve as a fundamental infrastructure in underpinning healthcare transformation, removing the boundaries between different healthcare professions providing different levels of care in different sectors.

Public Private Interface – Electronic Patient Record sharing Pilot Project (PPI-ePR) is the first step towards this goal. PPI-ePR has provided a proof-of-concept on the feasibility and acceptability of eHR sharing amongst healthcare providers and patients in general. The pilot has also provided valuable experience and insights into the potential challenges of implementing eHR sharing system on a wider scale. Thus its future evolution will form essential building blocks for the future eHR sharing infrastructure. We will also work on how best to migrate patients and private healthcare professionals already registered in PPI-ePR to the eHR platform, when its user portal is available for sharing by 2013-14.

What is PPI-ePR?

The growing popularity of web technology has created a new window of opportunity for information communication, dissemination and assimilation. Hospital Authority (HA) has tried to harness this technology to achieve quality patient care in Hong Kong. Thus, HA rolled out PPI-ePR since April 2006, using a secure platform to enable registered private practitioners access to ePR of consenting individual patients. The PPI-ePR Project implemented a web-based electronic system to allow integrated, real-time patient-based information to be shared among clinics, private and public hospitals. This presents a much advanced step in information sharing between the public and private sectors. Such sharing aimed to ensure that complete and accurate healthcare information is available to Hong Kong citizens, via various healthcare providers, through a secure and stable IT system. This could also reduce the healthcare cost by minimizing repetitions of investigations, and minimize risks of medical error by obtaining up-to-date medical history and allergy information available at the point of care.

Up to June 2011, the PPI-ePR pilot has thus far enrolled over 153,000 patients, 2,250 private healthcare professionals, and over 248,000 numbers of ePR access have been made by the participating private hospitals, other private or non-governmental organizations providing services related to healthcare, such as residential care facilities and community centres.

Each registered patient will be given a personal identification number. With the patient’s consent, private healthcare provider registered in the project can view the patient’s clinical information online, such as discharge summaries, diagnosis, procedure codes, laboratory/radiology results, medication orders, allergies and future appointments.

Security and Confidentiality

In order to safeguard patients’ privacy and confidentiality, sensitive data and important identifiers such as name, address, date of birth, Hong Kong identify card number, user password and patient access key stored in the system, are encrypted using Triple DES encryption algorithm and also protected by firewall.

In order to ensure that access to the clinical records is provided to the authorized person only, a two-factor authentication process is used. The enrolled healthcare professionals are given two factors of identification, the first being their log-in ID and password, plus a second factor in the form of a security token. Security token provided a more reliable user authentication than passwords, with changing number displayed on the token generated by the server at one minute interval. In order to successfully log into the system, the patient enrolled in the project would also be required to produce his or her own password. Additionally, whenever the records are being accessed, a SMS message will immediately be sent to the patient’s or a relatives’ mobile phone alerting him / her as such. All of the above security measures are in place to ensure data confidentiality, and have been found to be satisfactory following both external and internal audits.

Patient Corner

HA’s patients with valid Hong Kong Identity Card / Hong Kong Birth Certificate can join the Pilot Project on a voluntary basis, free of charge.

Please prepare the following documents for registration:
1. Application form
2. Hong Kong Identity Card / Hong Kong Birth Certificate (please provide copy if not applying in person)
3. Address proof (if request to change the residential address recorded in HA)

(1)Application by mail, fax or email
Address: PPI-ePR Programme Office, Suite Nos. 2-15, 7th Floor, Exchange Tower, 33 Wang Chiu Road, Kowloon Bay, Kowloon
Fax: 2194-0666
Email: ppi.epr@ha.org.hk

(2)Application in person
1. HA’s Patients Registration Centres (see “Patient’s Registration” below)
2. Private Hospital / Authorized Private Healthcare Institutions (please call project hotline: 2300-6654 for participating institutions)

2(a)Smart ID Enrolment
“Pilot Use of Smart ID Card for Patient Enrolment”
New and Simple Way to Enrol - Take Smart Action

To streamline patient enrolment and enhance the security and accuracy of PPI-ePR, HA has launched a new initiative of the use of Hong Kong Smart Identity Card (Smart ID card) for patient enrolment.

If you are 18 or above, you can choose to use your Smart ID card to enrol in PPI-ePR. The use of Smart ID card is entirely voluntary. To enrol, you should apply in person. Staff will ask you to insert your Smart ID card into a government-approved card reader to access card face data on your Smart ID card. An application form will be printed for your signature.

A recent survey and statistical report revealed that more than 85% of eligible participants opt to enrol in PPI-ePR using Smart ID card, which truly reflects the wide acceptance by the public on such use of Smart ID card for patient enrolment.

The Smart ID enrolment method is now available at 18 Patient Registration Centres under HA, all Families Clinics and selected Elderly Health Centres under the Department of Health (DH), authorized Private Hospitals and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

*Remark:
The Smart ID enrolment method would not be applicable to participants under 18 at this stage. You may still choose to submit the completed application form by other means (mail, fax or email).

2(b)Submit Application Form by Authorized Person
Applicants who opts to authorize a person to act on his/her behalf to submit application for enrolment to PPI-ePR at HA’s Patients Registration Centre should complete the PPI-ePR Application form and the “Authorization Letter for Patient Enrolment”.

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