Next week is HISA's national conference (HIC09) in Canberra and it's time for reflection on some of the big issues in e-health.  In consumer e-health this has got to include how consumers are going to take advantage of the significant planned invest in the "professional" e-health systems.

First, what do I mean by professional e-health system.  Well, these are the technologies that link our hospitals/clinics,  pharmacy, diagnostic and care planing operations.  They will enable the health consumer to get safer and more cost effective care.  This is all about how we treat patients when they are in care.

Ok, these are pretty significant benefits, BUT....they don't reflect what could be some even larger benefits generated through our e-health investment.  These are the benefits driven from actually keeping patients out of care and they are realised through engaging consumers more effectively in their own health mangement. 

While there is a strong recognition of the need for a personal health record for consumers, that system, by itself, is not going to entice consumers to take better care of themselves.  Health consumers require high value experiences to better engage themselves in managing their own care. 

Some of these experiences are now being partialy delivered (albeit in a relatively disjointed fashion) with highly engaging online systems that support all types of health and fitness needs, with well qualified information resources, online therapy, training and social networking processes.  These are supported with an exciting range of sensors and devices which often use game technology to make information input and tracking an enjoyable and a higher value experience.  What they often lack (except in the case of some excellent mental health examples) is the linkage with care providers and the provision of high quality coaching and feedback to guide the consumer.

The ability to link these consumer e-health systems, perhaps through the Personal Health Record, to the professional health systems will allow a crucial link between the consumer and the care provider to be forged.  This will enable the consumer to experience highly relevant and context specific professional feedback that will drive more effective everyday decisions about their health.  It could also deliver an accurate and rich source of valuable patient information to improve the care process when the consumer does find themselves in the health system.

So what REALLY excites me about consumer e-health is its this ability to cost effectively link the care professional and the consumer with information and tools which enable long term better personal health decisions.

I have written a presentation on this issue for the Nursing Informatics Conference next week.  It has a more extensive discussion of this issue with lots of links to sites of interest.  You can download a copy by clicking here