SPMS, the Portuguese Shared Services of the Ministry of Health and the Hong Kong Hospital Authority reached an agreement, on the 12th of July, to develop both national digital health sectors.
Both parties put forward a Letter of Intent to Collaborate, which foresees a three-year partnership based on good practices, setting a joined strategy with a strong focus on, among other things, clinical system design; mobile application development; systems usability and Big Data analytics.
The two entities, acknowledged the need to take part in the digital revolution and identified the share of information, services and capabilities as a vital priority in order to advance national health systems, and citizens well-being.
The relationship between Portugal and Hong Kong has deepen over time, and Portugal considers that Hong Kong has an excellent digital health model. The Hong Kong Hospital Authority has taken a comprehensive approach, with a unique technical system available in the whole territory, and has built up a strong IT and Informatics workforce, which is much larger than the team at SPMS.
Portugal has developed many digital health advancements. Following the incorporation in the Global Digital Health Partnership in 2018, which is an informal collaboration partnership between governments, territories, agencies and the World Health Organization, SPMS has been taking the lead in digital health in Portugal and in Europe.
SPMS has made stepping-stone activities, such as coordinating eHAction, a European Joint Action supporting the eHealth Network, and promoting a technical workshop about Cybersecurity, which was highly praised at the Global Digital Health Partnership Summit in New Deli.
This comes in the spirit of sharing information, strategies and best practices to support digital health systems in the different countries, reaching a global collaboration, a path SPMS has been taking. Furthering this spirit, SPMS has been invited to organize and promote the next Global Digital Health Partnership Summit, scheduled for March 2020 in Lisbon.
