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Electronic health record utilisation: challenges and opportunities in Kingdom of Bahrain

AKRAM JALAL-KARIM, WAEL AL-MAHDI, HUDA A. RAHIM, NADA AL-SHABAAN, SAMEH AL-MANEA, AHLIA UNIVERSITY, KINGDOM OF BAHRAIN

Abstract: As the situation stands in public health outlets in Bahrain, patients’ records are kept in a conventional cabinet filing system. This poses a challenge for health care providers concerning continuity and coherence of information and communication between different stages of the health provision chain. Despite a developing e-government initiative in Bahrain, health care must receive greater focus. An electronic health records (EHR) system is expected to provide health care staff with comprehensive patient information to improve communication and aid clinical decision making. In this article, we propose a nation-wide EHR network connecting all public health outlets. Several key issues are discussed, principally the replacement of the current manual system with electronic accessibility to health records. Another issue is sharing patient history, which is essential for medical decision making, between various stages of health care chain such as physicians, laboratories and appointments; the information shared will include test results, diagnoses, management and medication needs. Barriers to implementation and standardisation are also an issue. Finally, the technical issues of security and malleability are assessed.
Keywords: Electronic Health Record, Healthcare Management, Healthcare Standardisation

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